A Wide Tuning-Range mm-Wave LC-VCO Sized Using Evolutionary Algorithms

Designing a LC Voltage Controlled Oscillator (LC-VCO) for mm-Wave frequencies requires a careful balance of interdependent design parameters. The losses due to passive elements dictate the required cross coupled pair transconductance (g m ), which in turn affects the tuning range via fixed capacitance. As such, the design process requires significant engineering time. An optimization methodology using a genetic algorithm is proposed to optimize component selection for use in the LC-VCO. The design for the LC-VCO is broken into pseudo-independent sub-modules to allow the designer greater control and to allow the optimization to benefit from manual circuit intuition. Performance of the components chosen by the genetic algorithm is verified using a circuit simulator to achieve a center frequency of 29 GHz with a 15.8 GHz tuning range. The simulated phase noise performance is -103.2 dBc/Hz using a 10 MHz frequency offset.A one-year embargo was granted for this item.Academic Major: Electrical and Computer Engineerin

Innovative Design and Realization of Microwave and Millimeter-Wave Integrated circuits

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH