A differential BiCMOS divide‐by‐4 injection‐locked frequency divider

A low power wide locking range divide‐by‐4 injection‐locked frequency divider (ILFD) is proposed in the letter and was implemented in the TSMC 0.18 μm SiGe BiCMOS process. The divide‐by‐4 ILFD uses a cross‐coupled voltage‐controlled oscillator with an active inductor and a three‐transistor composite consisted of two nMOSFETs and one pMOSFET to serve as an injection device with the function of linear and nonlinear mixers. At the supply voltage of 1.5 V and at the incident power of 0 dBm, the operation range of the divide‐by‐4 is 2.3 GHz, from the incident frequency 14.5 to 16.8 GHz, the percentage is 14.7%. The locking range of the divide‐by‐4 is 1.7 GHz, from the incident frequency from 14.6 to 16.3 GHz, the percentage is 11%. The core power consumption is 1.5 mW. The die area is 0.465 × 0.317 mm 2 . © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 54:2825–2828, 2012; View this article online at wileyonlinelibrary.com. DOI 10.1002/mop.27204