Rf Micro Devices, Inc.

Qorvo Us, Inc.

Ralph Christopher Nieri

Scott R Humphreys

Nathaniel Peachey

George Adrian Maxim

Baker P Scott

Dirk Robert Walter Leipold

Tracy Hall

Circuitry includes a floating-body main field-effect transistor (FET) device, a body-contacted cascode FET device, and biasing circuitry coupled to the floating-body main FET device and the body-contacted cascode FET device. The floating-body main FET device includes a gate contact, a drain contact, and a source contact. The body-contacted cascode FET device includes a gate contact, a drain contact coupled to a supply voltage, and a source contact coupled to the drain contact of the floating-body main FET device and to a body region of the body-contacted cascode FET device. The biasing circuitry is coupled to the gate contact of the floating-body main FET device and the gate contact of the body-contacted cascode FET device and configured to provide biasing signals to the floating-body main FET device and the body-contacted cascode FET device such that a majority of the supply voltage is provided across the body-contacted cascode FET device.

Low noise amplifier

Self-biasing transistor switching circuitry includes a main transistor, a biasing transistor, a first capacitor, and a second capacitor. The body of the main transistor is isolated from the gate, the drain, and the source of the main transistor by an insulating layer. The first capacitor is coupled between the source and the gate of the main transistor. The second capacitor is coupled between the source and the body of the main transistor. The body and the drain of the main transistor are coupled together. The gate and the drain of the biasing transistor are coupled to the gate of the main transistor. The drain of the biasing transistor is coupled to the drain of the main transistor. The self-biasing transistor switching circuitry is adapted to receive an oscillating signal at the drain of the main transistor, and use the oscillating signal to appropriately bias the main transistor.

Local voltage control for isolated transistor arrays

The present invention provides circuitry for maintaining the desired phase noise across the tuning range of a frequency synthesizer by compensating the voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) bias current according to various tuning parameters available within the frequency synthesizer, thereby reducing overall current drain and inductor quality factor requirements. In general, the present invention includes a VCO bias circuit capable of controlling the VCO bias current in response to a control signal provided by additional circuitry based on the operating frequency of the frequency synthesizer. Further, the VCO bias current changes in response to changing the operating frequency of the frequency synthesizer.

Frequency synthesizer having VCO bias current compensation

The present invention provides an efficient coarse tuning process for fractional-N synthesizers. In general, a divided reference signal and a divided controllable oscillator (CO) signal from the phase lock loop (PLL) of a synthesizer are each further divided by a common factor M to provide an average reference signal and an average CO signal, respectively. Averaging the divided CO signal reduces jitter caused by fractional-N division of the CO signal. The frequencies of the average CO signal and the average reference signal are compared and the result is used to select an appropriate tuning curve for operating the CO.

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Summerfield, NC, United States of America

Ralph Christopher Nieri