Since its first technology qualification in 1996 in IBM’s Advanced Semiconductor Technology Center (ASTC), Hopewell Junction, NY, silicon germanium (SiGe) has become the darling of the chip world, with new product and development agreement announcements made on nearly a daily basis. In this paper, we update progress made in SiGe since our 1Q97 IBM MicroNews article [1], tracing a number of busi...

Self-powered microsystems like wireless microsensors and biomedical implants derive power from in-package minibatteries that can only store sufficient energy to sustain the system for a short life. The environment, however, is a rich source of energy that, when harnessed, can replenish the otherwise exhausted battery. The problem is harvesters generate low power levels and the electronics requi...

A universal BiCMOS low-voltage-swing transceiver (driver/receiver) with low on-chip power consumption is reported. Using a 3.3 V supply, the novel transceiver can drive/receive signals from several low-voltage-swing transceivers with termination voltages ranging from 5 V down to 2 V and frequencies well above 1 GHz. Measured results of test circuits fabricated in 0.8m BiCMOS technology are also...

This thesis describes 80−94GHz and 70−77GHz interpolating phase shifters and the corresponding transmitter and receiver ICs, fabricated in 65-nm CMOS and SiGe BiCMOS technologies, respectively. Lumped inductors and transformers are employed to realize small-form factor 90◦ hybrids as needed in high density phased arrays. The CMOS transmitter exhibits absolute phase and amplitude errors of 4◦ an...

The simple realization of the current-controlled conveyor transconductance amplifier (CCCTA) in BiCMOS technology is introduced. The proposed BiCMOS CCCTA realization is based on the use of differential pair and basic current mirror, which results in simple structure. Its characteristics, that is, parasitic resistance (R x) and current transfer (i o/i z), are also tunable electronically by exte...

An Arithmetic logic Unit (ALU) is an integral part of a computer processor. It has the capability of performing a no. of different arithmetic and logic operations such as addition, subtraction, bit-shifts and magnitude comparison. ALUs of various bit-widths are frequently required in very large-scale integrated circuits (VLSI) from processors to application specific integrated circuits (ASICs)....

Dual application of Si–Ge alloy in thermoelectric and BICMOS the semiconductor industry.

Stacking fault formation during epitaxial SiGe layer growth in bipolar complementary metal oxide semiconductor (BiCMOS) process which caused high yield loss due to its leakage current on bipolar transistors has been studied. Through the analysis of process flow, oxidation induced stacking faults were indicated as a possible root cause of the yield loss. The identification of the oxidation induc...