Power Amplifier Chipset for Low-Orbit Satellite Communication Ground Station

This work presents a power amplifier chipset composed of a driver stage power amplifier (PA) monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) chip and a final stage PA MMIC chip for V-band low-orbit high-throughput satellite communication ground station system. The drive stage PA adopts GaAs process, in the frequency range of 47-52 GHz, the small signal gain is greater than 17 dB, the input S11 is less than -8 dB and the output S 22 is less than -10 dB; the final stage PA adopts GaN process, in the frequency range of 47-52 GHz, the power gain is greater than 16 dB, the saturated output power is up to 40 dBm, and the power additional efficiency is more than 22%. In addition, the heat dissipation of the chip is further designed to reduce the junction temperature. The measured maximum junction temperature of the GaN PA chip is 173.14 °C, which is useful for improving the long-term reliability of the chipset.