A ${D}$ -Band Digital Transmitter with 64-QAM and OFDM Free-Space Constellation Formation.

A ${D}$ -band I/Q RF-DAC featuring two 6-bit DAC elements driven in quadrature, each with its own on-die antenna, and a total effective isotropic radiated power (EIRP) of 13.2 dBm, is demonstrated in a 45-nm SOI-CMOS technology. The carrier signal is first amplified by the 30-dB gain LO path and is directly modulated by the 12 baseband bit streams, without linear upconversion or power amplification. QPSK, 8-PSK, 16-QAM, 32-QAM, and 64-QAM single-carrier (SC) and OFDM constellations are formed in free space and measured above the die at data rates up to 12 Gb/s and at distances over 15 cm. The large-signal bandwidth—from the carrier input pad to the output of the transmitter above the antennas—is 130–142 GHz and was obtained by sweeping the frequency of the ${D}$ -band external carrier, modulating it on die at 0.4 Gb/s using 16-QAM format, and measuring the error vector magnitude (EVM) with an instrumentation receiver. The highest data rate of 12 Gb/s was measured for QPSK SC modulation with a corresponding EVM of −12.2 dB. Lower maximum data rates of 7 Gb/s with −14.3-dB EVM and 3.6 Gb/s with −19-dB EVM were observed for 16-QAM and 64-QAM formats, respectively. Spectral shaping and OFDM transmission were also demonstrated at up to 2.5 Gb/s. The prototype consumes a total of 1.25 W, with an energy efficiency of 104 pJ/b. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]