A Novel Reconfigurable Quad-band Power Amplifier with Reconfigurable Biasing Network and LTCC Substrates

This paper presents a novel MEMS-based reconfigurable multi-band power amplifier (PA) that employs a newly proposed reconfigurable biasing network and partitioned LTCC substrates. The biasing network comprises transmission lines, capacitors, and switches. Because DC bias current does not flow through switches, the proposed network functions as a multi-band low-loss biasing network. The partitioned multi-layer substrates improve the degree of freedom for further circuit design. According to the proposed design scheme, a quad-band PA is designed and fabricated. The fabricated 1W-class PA achieves high output power of 30 dBm and maximum power added efficiency of over 40% in the 1, 1.5, 2, and 2.5-GHz bands.