Decade-Bandwidth RF-Input Pseudo-Doherty Load Modulated Balanced Amplifier using Signal-Flow-Based Phase Alignment Design
Abstract: This paper reports a first-ever decade-bandwidth pseudo-Doherty load-modulated balanced amplifier (PD-LMBA), designed for emerging 4G/5G communications and multi-band operations. By revisiting the LMBA theory using the signal-flow graph, a frequency-agnostic phase-alignment condition is found that is critical for ensuring intrinsically broadband load modulation behavior. This unique design methodology enables, for the first time, the independent optimization of broadband balanced amplifier (BA, as the peaking) and control amplifier (CA, as the carrier), thus fundamentally addressing the longstanding limits imposed on the design of wideband load-modulated power amplifiers (PAs). To prove the proposed concept, an ultra-wideband RF-input PD-LMBA is designed and developed using GaN technology covering the frequency range from 0.2 to 2 GHz. Experimental results demonstrate an efficiency of 51% to 72% for peak output power and 44% to 62% for 10-dB OBO, respectively.
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