Characterization of Concurrent Dual-Band Power Amplifiers Using a Dual Two-Tone Excitation Signal

Abstract

A method to characterize the memory effects in a nonlinear concurrent dual-band transmitter is presented. It is an extension of the conventional two-tone test for power amplifiers to concurrent dual-band transmitters. The output signal of a concurrent dual-band transmitter is affected not only by intermodulation (IM) products but also by cross-modulation (CM) products. In one frequency band, the transmitter is excited by a two-tone signal which frequency separation is swept. In the second band, the transmitter is concurrently excited by another two-tone signal with slightly wider frequency separation. The frequency difference of the two signals is fixed during the frequency sweep. The two-tone test is made at different power levels. The upper and lower third-order IM and CM products are measured. The asymmetry between the upper and lower third-order IM and CM products are measures of the transmitter's memory effects. The measurement results show that the memory effects are more dominant in the third-order IM products than in the CM products. An error analysis and system calibration was performed and measurement results for two different devices are presented.