Design and Development of Gigahertz Range VCO Based on Intrinsically Tunable Film Bulk Acoustic Resonator

Abstract: The purpose of this thesis is to design and fabricate Gigahertz range voltage controlled oscillator based on intrinsically tunable film bulk acoustic resonator.Modified Butterworth Van Dyke (MBVD) model was studied and implemented to simulate FBAR behavior. Advanced designed system (ADS) was used as the simulation tool.Oscillator theory is studied and an oscillator based on non-tunable FBAR at 2GHz is simulated which shows -132 dBc/Hz phase noise @ 100 kHz offset frequency.A 5.5 GHz Voltage controlled oscillator based on intrinsically tunable FBAR is designed. Frequency tuning of 129 MHz with phase noise of -106 dBc/Hz @ 100 kHz is achieved. The circuit is designed on a novel carrier substrate which includes integrated resonators and passive components. Bipolar junction transistors are mounted on the carrier substrate by silver epoxy. The thesis describes the design, development and processing of the carrier substrate, BSTO based resonators, and the oscillator circuit.