A Highly Integrated Triple-Band RF Front-End Module for WiMAX Applications

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

<P>This paper presents a compact and highly integrated triple-band RF front-end module (FEM) for worldwide interoperability for microwave access (WiMAX) applications using multilayer low temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) technology. The proposed RF FEM is composed of a TX triplexer, an RX triplexer, and a TX/RX switch. Both TX and RX triplexers are fully embedded in an LTCC substrate and the TX/RX switch is placed on the substrate. The TX triplexer consists of 2- and 5-GHz lowpass filters, a 3-GHz highpass filter, and a matching circuit. On the other hand, the RX triplexer consists of miniaturized 2-, 3-, 5-GHz coupled-resonator bandpass filters and a matching circuit, which are stacked up for space saving. In TX path, the RF FEM provides an insertion loss of 1.8dB, 2.1dB and 2.5dB at 2-, 3-, and 5-GHz band, respectively, with a high second-harmonic suppression characteristic. In RX path, the RF FEM also provides a low insertion loss at three passbands with high attenuation at other passbands. The size of the proposed RF FEM is only 4.0mm × 5.0mm with a substrate thickness of 0.73mm. The measured results are in good agreement with the simulated results.</P>