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AIN SHAMS UNIVERSITY

Faculty of Engineering
ECE Department


ECE484 Spring 2014 RF Circuit Design Prof. Emad Hegazi
Dr. Mohamed El-Nozahi

Problem Set 1
Transceiver Architectures

Problem
1
1

A Bluetooth receiver employs a low-noise amplifier having a gain of 10 and an input impedance
of 50 . The LNA senses a desired signal level of -80 dBm at 2.41 GHz and two interferers of
equal levels at 2.42 GHz and 2.43 GHz. Assuming the LNA drives a 50 load.

(a) Determine the value of
3
that yields a P
1dB
of -30 dBm
(b) If each interferer is 10 dB below P
1dB
, determine the corruption experienced by
the desired signal at the LNA output.

Problem
2
2

An LNA senses a -80 dBm signal at 2.41 GHz and two -20 dBm interferers at 2.42 GHz and 2.43
GHz. What IIP
3
is required if the IM products must remain 20 dB below the signal? Assume 50
interfaces at the input and the output.

Problem
3
3

Suppose an interferer contains phase modulation but not amplitude modulation. Does cross
modulation occur in this case?

Problem
4
4

An LNA having an IIP
3
of -10 dBm and a gain of 20 dB is followed by a mixer with an IIP
3
of
+4 dBm. Which stage limits the IP
3
of the cascade more?




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Problem
5
5

Consider the scenario shown in Fig.1 where

. The BPF provides an

attenuation of 17 dB at

and 37 dB at

.

(a) Find the IIP
3
of the amplifier such that the intermodulation product falling at

is
20 dB below the desired signal.
(b) Assume the amplifier with a voltage gain of 10 dB and an IIP
3
of 500 (mV
p
)
preceding the BPF. Calculate the IIP
3
total if the overall chain. (Neglect 2
nd
order
nonlinearities.)



Problem 6

Find the noise figure of the shunt resistance Rp with respect to the source resistance Rs shown in
Fig.2.
Rp
Rs
Vin
Vout



Problem 7

Find the noise figure of the cascade in Fig. 3.

(a) Assuming lossless switch
(b) Assuming the switch having a 1.5 dB insertion loss

Fig. 1
Fig. 2

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LNA
G=-1.5 dB NF=2 dB



Problem
6
8

For the sliding-IF architecture shown in Fig. 4

(a) Determine the required LO frequency range and steps.
(b) Determine the image frequency range.









Problem
6
9

Consider the 11g sliding-IF receiver shown in Fig. 2.

(a) Determine the required LO frequency range.
(b) Determine the image frequency range.
(c) Is this architecture preferable to that in Fig. 4? Why?












Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 3

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Problem
7
10

Fig. 6 shows three variants of the Hartley architecture. Explain which one(s) can reject the
image.

Problem
8
11

Fig. 7 shows a dual conversion Rx, where the first LO frequency is chosen so as to place the
(primary) image in the GPS band. Mixing spurs emerge due to the mixing with LO harmonics.
Consider the impact of the 2
nd
harmonic of the second local oscillator.

LNA
420 MHz
1980 MHz
400 MHz
20 MHz
2000 MHz

Fig. 6

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Problem 12

An RF receiver front end is shown in Fig. 8. The Rx has a bandwidth of 200 KHz and a channel
spacing of 250 KHz. The sensitivity of the Rx is -106 dBm and the targeted SNR at the output is
7 dB.

(a) Find the overall noise figure of the Rx
(b) Find the minimum gain of the LNA required to achieve the -106 dBm sensitivity
spec
(c) Find the overall IIP3
(d) Determine the spurious free dynamic range ( SFDR)

LNA
G=-3 dB G=?
NF=2.5 dB
IIP3= 5 dBm
G=-1 dB
G=10 dB
NF=12 dB
IIP3= 0 dBm
SNR=7 dB

















Fig. 7
Fig. 8

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Problem
9
13

LNA IRF1
LO x 2
LNA IRF2
Channel
select
BPF1
BPF2
At 1.4 GHz
(A)
(B)
2.4 GHz
< 2.4 GHz
Band 1
Band 2
fo fo+5 fo+10
LPF
LPF
MHz
-80 dBm
-30 dBm

The super heterodyne receiver in Fig. 9 uses a single local oscillator to detect 2 different RF
Bands. Band 1 is at 2.4GHz while Band 2 is at a higher frequency. Only 1 band is
demodulated at a time. Band Selection is done via the switch after the BPF. The mixers
only select the lower side band using the LPF and the IF frequency is fixed to 1.4 GHz.

(a) Find LO Central Frequency.
(b) Find The Central Frequency of Band 2.
(c) Determine the type of Injection at points (A) and (B) High Side Injection or Low Side
Injection
(d) For the 2.4 GHz Band, if when a signal of -80 dBm is received at 2.4GHz , a signal of -10
dBm is also received at the image frequency. The IRF1 rejects the image by 40 dB. If an
SNR of 20 dB is required, calculate the extra attenuation required by BPF1 at the image
frequency. Assume the image is the only type of noise. (Neglect thermal and circuits
Noise)
(e) For the 2.4 GHz Band:
Assuming the Signal (-80 dBm) and Blockers (-30 dBm) profile shown. The signal
BW=2MHz. The signal achieves a suitable SNR when the total NF=10 dB (Without
Blockers effect). If the IIM3 caused by the 2 blockers degrades this SNR by 3 dB, find
the required IIP3)tot.





Fig. 9

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References:

RF Microelectronics, Behzad Razavi. 2
nd
edition, prentice hall press, 2012.
1) Chapter 2, example 2.10
2) Chapter 2, example 2.11
3) Chapter 2, example 2.8
4) Chapter 2, example 2.13
5) Chapter 2, problem 2.5
6) Chapter 4, problem 4.4
7) Chapter 4, problem 4.20
8) Chapter 4, example 4.9
9) Quiz 1 , 2013

Wishing you success,
Eng/ Omar El Aassar