V‐band low phase‐noise oscillator based on a cavity resonator integrated in the silicon substrate of the MCM‐D platform

In this article, we present a V‐band low‐phase‐noise oscillator stabilized by a silicon integrated cavity resonator (SiCR). The SiCR is realized in a multi chip module‐deposited thin‐film technology platform. The high resistivity silicon substrate is thinned to 100 μm and through silicon vias are available. The resonator is formed by a double row of through silicon vias defining a TM 010 cylindrical cavity resonator. The area on top of the resonator is reused for flip‐chip mounting the active device, a MMIC chip realized in BiCMOS technology, implementing SiGe heterojunction bipolar transistors. A lower phase noise is demonstrated for the oscillator using SiCR in comparison with an idle oscillator using the same active device but a shorted CPW line as resonator. In the best case, the phase‐noise of the oscillator with SiCR is reduced to −102 dBc/Hz at 1‐MHz carrier offset, f osc = 54 GHz, from −89 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz carrier offset, f osc = 47.3 GHz, corresponding to the idle oscillator, using the CPW resonator. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 54:1788–1792, 2012; View this article online at wileyonlinelibrary.com. DOI 10.1002/mop.26946