Indraprastha Institute of

Information Technology Delhi ECE321/521

RF Circuit Design

Theory and Fundamentals

Simulation (Schematic to Layout

and Optimization) Prototyping and Measurements
 Indraprastha Institute of
Information Technology Delhi ECE321/521

RF Circuit Design (ECE321/521)

Instructor: Dr. Mohammad S. Hashmi

Class Timings: Monday & Thursday (10:00 – 11:30)

Lab/Project Timings: TBA

Office Hours: Thursday (17:00 – 18:00)

TAs: Dinesh Rano and Deepayan Banerjee

 Indraprastha Institute of
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Lecture-1 Date: 02.01.2017

• Introduction
• Differentiating factor between low and high frequency
circuits
• Behavior of Passive Components at High Frequency
• Transmission Line (Intro.)
 Indraprastha Institute of
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RF Circuit Design
Teacher: “Mogli, do you even know your multiplication tables?”
Mogli: “Well, I know of them”.

Like Mogli and his multiplication tables, many electrical engineers know of the
concepts of RF Circuit Design.

However, Concepts such as characteristic impedance, scattering parameters,

Smith charts and the like are familiar, but we often find that a complete,
thorough, and unambiguous understanding of these concepts can be
somewhat lacking.

Thus, the goals of this class are for you to:

• Obtain a complete, thorough, and unambiguous understanding of the
fundamental concepts on RF and High Frequency Engineering
• Apply these concepts to the design and analysis of useful high frequency
devices
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Pre-requisites:
Circuit Theory Fundamentals, Fields and Waves Fundamentals
Course Focus:
High Frequency Circuit and System Design for Cellular, WIFI, WLAN, and
Bluetooth Applications

Lab Components:
• Introduction to ADS, CST and SystemVue (mostly self learning, required
for course projects) – Rahul and TAs can help
• Introduction to VNA and Spectrum Analyzer and their Usage
• Rahul Gupta will be your contact point for Labs

Course Outline and Details:

http://www.iiitd.edu.in/~mshashmi/teaching
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Evaluation Mechanism
• Assignments (20%)
• [Pen & Paper + ADS] based

Text Book:
• Surprise Quizzes (15%) “RF Circuit Design: Theory
• all compulsory! and Applications” by R.
Ludwig, 2nd Ed., Pearson
• Exams and Project
• Project (30%) International
• Mid-Sem (20%)
• End-Sem (15%)

Other Recommended Resources:

• Microwave Engineering by D. M. Pozar, 4th Ed., John Wiley and Sons Inc.
• RF Circuit Design by C. Bowick, 2nd Ed., Newnes
• Secrets of RF Circuit Design by Joseph J. Carr, 3rd Ed., McGraw Hill
• RF Transistor Amplifier by G. Gonzalez, 2nd Ed., Prentice Hall
• IEEE Xplore, IEL, etc.
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Motivation
• Importance of RF Circuit Design
• Wireless/Wirebased Communication Circuits → multi-band and
multi-standard transceivers
• Global Positioning System (GPS)
• Increased clock speeds in ASICs/SoCs
• Automotive Electronics

Board Design Techniques of

Components such as
Design Focus in this Course Interconnects, PA, LNA, Filter etc.
at Cellular and other Wireless
Standard Frequencies
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Some design examples from Lab

 Indraprastha Institute of
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Motivation (contd.)
Frequency Spectrum
300 MHz – 3 GHz
100 Hz
ELF
10 kHZ
VLF Radio Frequency
100 kHz • TV
LF
MF (MW)
1 MHz • Wireless Phones
HF (SW)
3 MHz • GPS
30 MHz
VHF
300 MHz
UHF
1 GHz Microwave Frequency
SHF
30 GHz 8 GHz to 40 GHz • Radar
EHF
300 GHz • Remote Sensing
IR
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Why this course?

• Lumped components (wires, resistors, capacitors, inductors, connectors
etc.) behave differently at low and high frequencies.
• Why?
• current and voltage vary spatially over the component size
• Leads to the concept of distributed components!

The KCL and KVL are no more applicable

• What do we mean by distributed? :-> Example – Inductor

Low Frequency (Lumped) High Frequency (Distributed)

Z ?
Z  R  j L
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RF Behavior of Passive Components

• Why do inductors, capacitors, and resistors behave differently at
Radio Frequency?
• What is skin effect?
• Equivalent Circuit Model?
For conventional AC circuit analysis:
• R is considered frequency independent
• Ideal Inductor (L) possesses an impedance 𝑋𝐿 = 𝑗𝜔𝐿
• Ideal capacitor (C) possesses an impedance 𝑋𝐶 = 1 𝑗𝜔𝐶

Capacitor behaves as open circuit at DC and

low frequency whereas an Inductor behaves as
short circuit at DC and low frequencies
 Indraprastha Institute of
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RF Behavior of Resistors
At low frequency:
• Resistances, inductances, and capacitances
are formed by wires, coils, and plates etc.
• Even a single wire or a copper line on a PCB
possesses resistance and inductance.

• this cylindrical copper conductor has a

DC resistance: Length of
l cylinder
RDC 
 a  cond
2
conductivity
Radius of cylinder

• At DC, current flows uniformly I

distributed over the entire conductor DC Current Density: J z 0 
 a2
cross-sectional area.
 Indraprastha Institute of
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RF Behavior of Resistors (contd.)
• At AC, the alternating charge carrier flow establishes a magnetic field
that induces an electric field (Faraday’s Law) whose associated current
density opposes the initial current flow → this effect is very strong at
the center (r=0) where the impedance is substantially increased → as a
result the current flow resides at the outer periphery with the
increasing frequency.
Skin Effect

• The current density pI  ar

Jz  exp  (1  j )
at AC is given by: 2 aj r   

1
p 2   j cond 
 f  cond
Skin Depth
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RF Behavior of Resistors (contd.)
• 𝐽𝑧 drops with decrease in 𝑟 (proximity to the center)
• 𝛿 decreases with increase in frequency (skin depth from periphery
reduces with increased frequency) → the path for current conduction
remains nearer to the periphery (skin effect) → current density towards
center decreases with increase in frequency and increase in conductivity

Lead Solder
Seems the Best
for High
Frequency

However, copper is
still preferred
 Indraprastha Institute of
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RF Behavior of Resistors (contd.)
𝐽𝑧
Frequency sweep: For a fixed wire radius of 𝑎 = 1𝑚𝑚, the plot 𝐽𝑧0 as a
function of depth 𝑟:

Low Frequency
Shows Uniform Medium to High
Distribution Frequency Pushes
the Current to the
Periphery

RF Sees Current
Restricted to
Surface
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Resistors at High Frequencies

1. Carbon-composition resistors:

• Consists of densely packed dielectric particulates or carbon granules.

• Between each pair of carbon granules is very small parasitic capacitor.
• These parasitics, in aggregate, are significant → primarily responsible for
notoriously poor performance at high frequencies.

Equivalent Ckt Model:

Lead
Inductance

Combination of
parasitic capacitances
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Resistors at High Frequencies (contd.)
Equivalent Ckt Model:
2. Wire-wound Resistors:
Capacitance
between Windings

• Exhibit widely varying impedances over L2: lead inductance

L1: inductance of resistive wires
various frequencies.
C2: Interlead Capacitance
• The inductor 𝐿 is much larger here as
compared to carbon-composition
resistor. Resonant
• These resistors look like inductors → Frequency
impedances will increase with increase in
frequency.
• At some frequency 𝐹𝑟 , the inductance
will resonate with shunt capacitance →
leads to decrease in impedance.
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Resistors at High Frequencies (contd.)
Equivalent Ckt Model:
3. Metal-film Resistors:
Lead
Inductance

Ca models charge separation effects and Cb

models interlead capacitance

• Seems to exhibit very good characteristics over frequency.

• Values of 𝐿 and 𝐶 are much smaller as compared to wire-wound and
carbon-composition resistors.
• It works well up to 10 MHz → useful up to 100 MHz
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Resistors at High Frequencies (contd.)
4. Thin-film Chip Resistors:
• The idea is to eliminate or reduce the stray capacitances associated
with the resistors
• Good enough up to 2 GHz.
The end contacts
Protective coat prevents are required for
variations from any soldering
environmental purposes
interferences

A metal film (usually nichrome)

electrodes are inserted after layer is deposited on this ceramic
trimming the resistive layer to substrate → this layer works as
the desired value resistor
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Resistors at High Frequencies (contd.)
What is the reason for following behavior of a 2000Ω thin-film resistor?

HW # 0

Demonstrate using either ADS or MATLAB

 Indraprastha Institute of
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Capacitors at High Frequencies
Equivalent Circuit Representation of a Capacitor → for a parallel-plate
Inductance of the leads and
plates
Represents
Insulation
Resistance

Accounts for the losses

in the leads

A A At high frequency, the dielectric become lossy i.e.,

C   0 r
d d there is conduction current through it

impedance of capacitor becomes a parallel

combination of C and conductance Ge
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Capacitors at High Frequencies (contd.)

Presence of resonance due to

dielectric loss and finite lead
wires

• Above 𝐹𝑟 , the capacitor behaves as an inductor.

• In general, larger-value capacitors tend to exhibit more internal inductance
than smaller-value capacitors.
• Therefore, it may happen that a 0.1𝜇𝐹 may not be as a good as a 300𝑝𝐹
capacitor in a bypass application at 250 𝑀𝐻𝑧.
• The issue is due to significance of lead inductances at higher frequencies.
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Capacitors at High Frequencies (contd.)
Chip Capacitors

Cross-section of a
single-plate capacitor
connected to the
board
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Inductors at High Frequencies
Equivalent Circuit Representation of an Inductor → coil type

Composite Effect of all the

distributed Rd

Composite Effect of all the

distributed Cd
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Inductors at High Frequencies (contd.)

Presence of
resonance • Initially the reactance of inductor
follows the ideal but soon departs
from it and increases rapidly until it
reaches a peak at the inductor’s
resonant frequency (𝐹𝑟 ). Why?
• Above 𝐹𝑟 , the inductor starts to
behave as a capacitor.

Implement this in
HW#0
MATLAB or ADS
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Chip Inductors

Surface mounted inductors still

come as wire-wound coil →these
are comparable in size to the
resistors and capacitors
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Transmission Line
• It is a standard practice to use
metallic conductors for
transporting electrical energy
from one point of a circuit to
another. These conductors
are called interconnects.

• Therefore cables, wires,

conductive tracks on printed
circuit boards (PCBs), sockets,
packaging, metallic tubes etc
are all examples of
interconnect.
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Transmission Line (contd.)
• For short interconnect, the moment the switch is closed, a voltage will
appear across RL as current flows through it. The effect is instantaneous.
• Voltage and current are due to electric charge movement along the
interconnect.
• Associated with the electric charges are static electromagnetic (EM) field
in the space surrounding the short interconnect.
• The short interconnect system can be modelled by lumped RLC circuit.

Static EM Field
changes uniformly
i.e, when field at one
point increases, field
at other location also
increases It is important to note that
Model of
the values of RLCG are
Interconnect usually very small, at low
EM Field is static frequencies their effects can
be simply ignored
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Transmission Line (contd.)

• If the interconnection is long (in
comparison to the wavelength of
the signal frequency), it takes
some time for the voltage and
current to appear on the RL when
Long
the switch is closed.
Electric charges move from 𝑉𝑠 to the 𝑅𝐿 . As the charge move, there is
an associated EM field which travels along with the charges

In effect, there is propagating EM field along the interconnect. The

propagating EM field is called wave and the interconnect guiding the
wave is called transmission line.

A transmission line is a two-conductor system that is used to transmit a

signal from one point to another point.
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Transmission Lines (contd.)
• Variations in current and voltage across the circuit dimensions → KCL and
KVL can’t be directly applied → This anomaly can be remedied if the line is
subdivided into elements of small (infinitesimal) length over which the
current and voltage do not vary.

z Dz Dz Dz Dz

Circuit Model: Dz
RDz LDZ RDz LDZ RDz LDZ RDz LDZ
GDz CDz GDz CDz GDz CDz GDz CDz

lim  Infinite number of infinitesimal sections

Dz 0
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

i ( z, t ) RDz LDz
i( z  Dz, t )
 
v( z , t ) CDz v( z  Dz, t ) Lossy Transmission Line
GDz
Circuit Model
 
Apply KVL:
i ( z , t ) v( z , t )  v( z  Dz , t ) i ( z , t )
v( z , t )  v( z  Dz , t )  RDzi ( z , t )  LDz  Ri ( z , t )  L
t Dz t
Describes the v( z , t ) i ( z , t )
voltage along the   Ri ( z , t )  L For ∆𝑧 → 0
z t
transmission lines
KCL on this line segment gives: i( z, t )  i( z  Dz, t )  GDzv( z  Dz , t )  C Dz v( z  Dz, t )
t
Simplification results in: i( z, t )  Gv( z, t )  C v( z, t ) For ∆𝑧 → 0
z t
Describes the current along the transmission lines
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

Solution for Voltage and Current:
• For a sinusoidal excitation [i.e, 𝑉𝑠 𝑡 =
𝑉𝑠 𝑐𝑜𝑠 𝜔𝑡 ], the steady state voltages and v( z , t )  f ( z )cos(t   ( z ))
currents along the transmission line are also
sinusoidal functions of time whose dependence i ( z , t )  g ( z )cos(t   ( z ))
on position and time can be expressed as:
• 𝑓(𝑧) and 𝑔(𝑧) are real functions of position and 𝜑(𝑧) and η(𝑧) describe
the positional dependence of the phase.
v( z , t )  f ( z )cos(t   ( z ))  Re  f ( z )e j ( z )e jt 
• Alternatively,
i ( z , t )  g ( z )cos(t   ( z ))  Re  g ( z )e j ( z )e jt 

• Let us define these phasors: V ( z )  f ( z )e j ( z ) I ( z )  g ( z )e j ( z )

The phasors 𝑰(𝒛) and 𝑽(𝒛) are complex functions of position and express the
variations of current/voltage as a function of position along the transmission line.
 Indraprastha Institute of
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Transmission Lines (contd.)
• Therefore the current and
voltage functions can be v( z, t )  Re V ( z )e jt  i( z, t )  Re  I ( z )e jt 
 
expressed as:
• The time-harmonic form of the telegrapher equations are:
  f ( z )e j ( z ) e jt 
Re = - Re  R.g(z)e jη(z)e jωt + jωL.g(z)e jη(z)e jωt 
z
  g ( z )e j ( z ) e jt 
Re = - Re  G.f(z)e jφ(z)e jωt + jωC.f(z)e jφ(z)e jωt 
z

• With the substitution

of phasors, the Re
 V(z)e jωt  
= - Re RI(z)e jωt + jωLI(z)e jωt  
z
equations of voltage
and current wave
Re
 I(z)e jωt
= - Re

GV(z)e jωt
+

jωCV(z)e jωt
 
result in: z
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

• The differential equations for current and voltage along the transmission
line can be expressed in phasor form as:

Re

d V(z)e jωt  = - Re  RI(z)e jωt + jωLI(z)e jωt 
dz
d  I(z)e jωt 
Re = - Re  GV(z)e jωt + jωCV(z)e jωt 
dz
As 𝐼(𝑧) and 𝑉(𝑧) are function of
only position

V ( z ) dV ( z )

z dz
I ( z ) dI ( z )

z dz
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

• The equations can be simplified as:

 d V(z)  jωt 
 Re  + RI(z)+ jωLI(z)  e  = 0
 dz  
For further  d  I(z)  jωt 
simplification  Re  + GV(z)+ jωCV(z)  e  = 0
 dz  

 d V(z) 
At ωt=0, ejωt=1:  Re  + RI(z)+ jωLI(z)   = 0
 dz 

 d V(z)  
At ωt=π/2, ejωt=j:  Re  + RI(z)+ jωLI(z)  j  = 0
 dz  
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

• Finally we can write: d V(z) These differential
   R  j L  I(z) equations can be
dz
solved for the
d I(z)
   G  jC  V(z) phasors along the
dz transmission line
Differentiating with respect
to 𝒛 gives d 2 V(z)
2
  2
V ( z)  0
dz Here
d 2 I(z)
Transmission
2
  2
I ( z)  0
Line Wave dz
Equations
  ( R  j L)(G  jC )
Complex Propagation
Constant
    j
Attenuation Constant Phase Constant
(nepers/m) (radians/m)
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

• For lossless transmission line (i.e, transmission line where R and G are
negligible) - most common scenario in our transmission line based circuit
design:
Phase Constant is
  j   j LC also Propagation
Constant for a
No Attenuation
Lossless Line

Oh please, continue wasting my valuable time.

We both know that a lossless transmission line
is a physical impossibility.

True! However, a low-loss line is possible – in fact it is

typical! If 𝑹 ≪ 𝝎𝑳 and 𝑮 ≪ 𝝎𝑪, we find that the lossless
transmission line equations are excellent approximations!!!
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

• For a lossless transmission line the d 2 V(z)
2
  2
V ( z)  0
second order differential equation for dz
phasors are: d 2 I (z)
  2
I ( z)  0
   LC
2
dz

𝑽𝟎 + and 𝑽𝟎 − are complex

constants V ( z )  V0 e  j z  V0e j z
• Similarly the current phasor for a lossless line can be described:
1 dV ( z ) 1 d
I ( z)    V0 e  j z  V0e j z 
j L dz j L dz
 Gives the Definition of
 I ( z)  V0 e  j z  V0e j z 
L Characteristic
Impedance
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Transmission Lines (contd.)

Completely
L L L Dependent on L and C
Z0   
  LC C Characteristic Impedance for a
Lossless Line is Real
V0  j z V0 j z Opposite Signs in these Terms
 I ( z)  e  e Gives a Clue about Current Flow in
Z0 Z0 Two Different Directions

• The time dependent form of the voltage and current along the
transmission line can be derived from phasors as:

v( z , t )  Re V ( z )e jt   Re V0 e  j (  z t )  V0e j (  z t ) 

jt  V 
 j (  z t ) V 
j (  z  t ) 
i ( z , t )  Re  I ( z )e   Re  e0
 0
e 
 Z0 Z0 
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Transmission Lines (contd.)
• For the simple case of 𝑽𝟎 + and 𝑽𝟎 − being real, the voltage and current
along the transmission line can be expressed as:
v( z , t )  V0 cos(t   z )  V0 cos(t   z )
V0 V0
i( z, t )  cos(t   z )  cos(t   z )
Z0 Z0

V0 cos(t   z ) V0 cos(t   z )

Wave Functions

• Let us examine the wave characteristics of v1 ( z , t )  V0 cos(t   z )