Current‐reused CMOS 8:1 injection‐locked frequency divider employing two wide locking range subfrequency dividers

Abstract

AbstractConventional current‐reused 8:1 injection‐locked frequency dividers (ILFDs) either use a 2:1 p‐core LC sub‐ILFD stacking on a direct‐injection 4:1 n‐core LC sub‐ILFD or a 2:1 ring‐oscillator LC sub‐ILFD stacking on a direct‐injection 4:1 n‐core LC sub‐ILFD. Because the current‐mode 4:1 n‐core LC sub‐ILFD normally has a smaller locking range, it restricts the locking range of a current‐reused 8:1 ILFD. This article studies a wide locking range 8:1 current‐reused ILFD designed in a 0.18 μm CMOS process. The designed 8:1 ILFD uses a 4:1 ring‐oscillator LC sub‐ILFD stacking on a direct‐injection 2:1 n‐core LC sub‐ILFD. At the core power consumption 19.53 mW and at the incident power of 0 dBm, the 8:1 locking range is 1.11 GHz (65.37%), from the incident frequency 4.16–8.2 GHz.