CMOS Technology Characterization for Analog and RF Design

The design of analog and radio-frequency (RF) circuits in CMOS technology becomes increasingly more difficult as device modeling faces new challenges in deep submicrometer processes and emerging circuit applications. The sophisticated set of characteristics used to represent today’s “digital” technologies often proves inadequate for analog and RF design, mandating many additional measurements and iterations to arrive at an acceptable solution. This paper describes a set of characterization vehicles that can be employed to quantify the analog behavior of active and passive devices in CMOS processes, in particular, properties that are not modeled accurately by SPICE parameters. Test structures and circuits are introduced for measuring speed, noise, linearity, loss, matching, and dc characteristics.