Double Gate Double-Channel AlGaN/GaN MOS HEMT and its Applications to LNA with Sub-1 dB Noise Figure

The manuscript proposes a novel double gate double-channel AlGaN/GaN MOS high electron mobility transistor (DG-DC-MOS-HEMT) for the low noise amplifier (LNA) applications. Double-channel structure importance on high-frequency noise and analog/RF performance of AlGaN/GaN HEMT have been explored in this work through TCAD device simulations. The existence of lower channels improves the transconductance (g(m)), unity gain cut-off frequency (f(T)), and minimum noise figure (NFmin) of DG-DC-MOS-HEMT compared to DG-MOS-HEMT. The DG-DC-MOS-HEMT with channel length of 220 nm exhibits g(m) of 0.85mS/um, f(T) of 137GHz, and NFmin of 0.21 dB. For the first time in this paper, an LNA using DG-DC-MOS-HEMT has been designed for X-Band radar applications. An s2p model is developed for DG-DC-MOS-HEMT and the models are incorporated into the ADS simulator to utilize the proposed device in circuit simulations. Comparing the results of LNA by DG-DC-MOS-HEMT with LNA by DG-MOS-HEMT at f = 10GHz, an increase of 56% and 36%, respectively, in noise figure (NF) and forward voltage gain (S-21), was found. This paper gives an opportunity to attain high-performance LNA with the proposed DG-DC-MOS-HEMT.

Automated summary

The manuscript proposes a novel double gate double-channel AlGaN/GaN MOS high electron mobility transistor (DG-DC-MOS-HEMT) for low noise amplifier (LNA) applications. Through TCAD device simulations, the importance of double-channel structure on high-frequency noise and analog/RF performance of AlGaN/GaN HEMT has been explored. The DG-DC-MOS-HEMT exhibits improved transconductance, unity gain cut-off frequency, and minimum noise figure compared to DG-MOS-HEMT. Furthermore, an LNA using DG-DC-MOS-HEMT has been designed for the first time in this paper, demonstrating an increase in noise figure and forward voltage gain compared to LNA using DG-MOS-HEMT.