This year, IMS visits Hawaii

Held from June 3 to 8 in Honolulu, Hawaii, the International Microwave Symposium (IMS) 2007 will be is the centerpiece of Microwave Week 2007, which also includes the Radio-Frequency Integrated Circuit Symposium (www.rfic2007.org) and the Automatic Radio-Frequency Techniques Group Conference (www.arftg.org). The conference expects to draw over 10,000 participants and will include about 400 exhibiting companies from around the world. Attendees will hear presentations outlining the latest advances in the industry and see innovative new products. Here is a sampling of some of the products to be exhibited.

Semiconductors

National Instruments (Austin, TX) will show 11 PXI RF switches, which include 4 x 1, terminated 4 x 1, dual 4 x 1 and 8 x 1 multiplexers as well as quad SPDT and dual-terminated SPDT general-purpose configurations. The six 2.5-GHz 75-Ω modules are suited for high-frequency video applications, such as set-top box testing. The other five 2.7-GHz 50-Ω modules are ideal for expanding the channel count of RF generators, such as the NI PXI-5671 2.7 GHz vector signal generator, or RF analyzers such as the NI PXI-5661 2.7 GHz vector signal analyzer.

Ideal for the wireless infrastructure and WiMax markets, the family of GaAs pHEMT LNAs from RFMD (Greensboro, NC) operates from 700 to 3,800 MHz in a QFN package. Features include a noise figure of 0.7 dB, an intercept point of 36.0 dB, and a single supply voltage of 3.0 to 6.0 V.

RFMD’s LNAs

Mimix Broadband (Houston, TX) will demo the XM1001-QH image reject mixer that operates over 10.0 to 34.0 GHz. Suited for millimeter-wave point-to-point radio, LMDS, satellite communications, and VSAT applications, this device features 6.0-dB conversion loss and an image rejection of 20.0 dB across the band. The part is available in a low-cost 4 x 4-mm QFN package that is RoHS compliant.

Mimix Broadband’s XM1001-QH image reject mixer

Tyco Electronics (Lowell, MA) will announce the M/A-COM MAPRST1030-1KS, a 1,000-W-peak Class C bipolar transistor designed for 1,030-MHz pulsed avionics applications. The transistor is ideally suited to operate in IFF/TACAN (tactical air navigation system) or similar short pulse formats and features a minimum gain of 8.0 dB with 45% minimum collector efficiency on a 50-Vdc supply. The part is housed in a hermetic ceramic/metal package that can tolerate a 10:1 load mismatch without damage or loss in performance.

Tyco Electronics 1,000-W peak bipolar transistor

Analog Devices (Norwood, MA) will showcase the ADF4113HV high-voltage phase-lock-loop synthesizer that is designed for use with VCOs that have tuning voltages up to 15 V. It consists of a low-noise digital phase frequency detector, a precision high-voltage charge pump, a programmable reference divider, programmable A and B counters, and a dual-modulus prescaler (P/P + 1). A simple 3-wire interface controls all of the on-chip registers.

Skyworks (Woburn, MA) whill showcase the SKY33100-360LF BAW filter for 802.11 bg access points. The part is housed in a QFN package and has a low-in band insertion less, low input-and-output return loss, and an operating frequency of 2.4 GHz.

Skywork’s SKY33100-360LF BAW filter

Test

At Agilent Technologies (Palo Alto, CA) booth we will see the N9340A handheld spectrum analyzer which is specifically designed for installation and maintenance field work, with frequency range from 100 kHz to 3 GHz. The analyzer offers a measurement speed of 10 ms at nonzero span and USB connectivity for memory stick and PC.

Agilent Technologies’ N9340A handheld spectrum analyzer

Oscillator

At Bliley’s (Erie, PA) booth you will see the NV45AA OCXO which feature a frequency range from 5 to 20 MHz, a temperature range from –40° to 85°C, CMOS and sinewave output options, and supply voltage options of 5.0, 12.0, and 15.0 V. Its 12- avd 15-V versions achieve a phase noise of –95 dBc/Hz at 1 Hz, –125 dBc/Hz at 10 Hz, and better than –150 dBc/Hz at 100 kHz.

EDA software

Agilent Technologies (Palo Alto, CA) will also showcase its EDA products Advanced Design System EDA software, RF Design Environment, IC-CAP device modeling software, Momentum, Electromagnetic Design System, GENESYS, SystemVue and GoldenGate. GENESYS and SystemVue are RF and microwave circuit and system design tools developed originally by Eagleware-Elanix and noted for ease-of-use and RF synthesis. GoldenGate is the most advanced RFIC simulation and analysis solution for integrated RF IC design.

Applied Wave Research (El Segundo, CA) is showcasing the latest version of its Microwave Office design suite, which offers openness and Interoperability. The latest release continues to deliver key productivity improvements that shorten design cycle time and speed time-to-market for RF/microwave products.

AWR’s Microwave Office design suite

Materials

Taconic-ADD (Petersburgh, NY) will feature a variety of low-loss and high-reliability materials offering for conventional and multilayer RF and high-speed digital board fabrication.

Christina Nickolas

*For more information on the International Microwave Symposium (IMS) 2007,visit http://www.ims2007.org.