Resonant amplifier-based sub-harmonic mixer for zero-IF transceiver applications

This paper describes a novel low voltage low power resonant amplifier-based sub-harmonic mixer using current reuse -bleeding technique for zero-IF transceiver systems applications. The novel resonant amplifier-based sub harmonic balun is designed and used in the mixer, which can double the frequency of the local oscillation (LO) signal. Moreover, the sub-harmonic balun can provide a pair of double frequency LO signals, unlike the conversional mixers, the novel sub-harmonic requires only one low power LO input. The proposed mixer delivers a remarkable conversion gain of 14.5 dB with local oscillator (LO) power of -2 dBm, and its power consumption is 0.65 mW with 0.8 V supply voltage. The input-referred third-order intercept point (IIP3) of the mixer is 1 dBm, and the chip area is only 0.52 mm(2).