A Novel Approach for Making Dynamic Range Measurements in Radio Frequency Front Ends for Software Controlled Radio Architectures

Abstract

A novel setup to perform two-tone spurious-free dynamic range (SFDR) measurements on a mixer using a single analog input port is introduced. When access to the intermediate frequency (IF) port in a radio frequency (RF) front-end circuit is not available, the traditional two-port method for making an SFDR measurement is inadequate. Passing the analog input through a directional coupler between the RF combiner and the mixer facilitates the performance of the traditional third order intermodulation (IMD) test. Key differences between the single-port and traditional two-port setups are explained, and experimental data obtained using the single-port setup is compared to data obtained using the traditional two-port setup for two different mixer models. This data confirms that while the single-port approach yields similar results, a calibration to account for the additional losses introduced by the directional coupler is needed.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Sep 01, 2007
Accession Number
ADA472268

Entities

People

  • Christian Fazi
  • Gregory Mitchell

Organizations

  • United States Army Research Laboratory

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Advanced Electronics
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Sensors

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Analyzers
  • Calibration
  • Circuits
  • Directional
  • Dynamic Range
  • Frequency
  • Insertion Loss
  • Intermediate Frequencies
  • Intermodulation
  • Local Oscillators
  • Low Noise
  • Low Noise Amplifiers
  • Measurement
  • Military Research
  • Radio Frequency
  • Signal Generators
  • Spectrum Analyzers

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Electronics Engineering
  • Microwave Engineering.
  • Systems Analysis and Design