Cost-effective 4 GHz VCO using only miniature spirals realized in a 0.18 µm CMOS process for wireless sensor network (WSN) applications

This paper presents an extremely cost-effective radio-frequency integrated circuit (RFIC) implementation technique by employing a digital logic CMOS process and reducing area occupation for voltage-controlled oscillators (VCOs) using all miniature inductors for wireless sensor network (WSN) applications. The designed VCO operates in the 4.0 GHz band with a power consumption of 1.4 mW and a phase noise of −113.6 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz, occupying a Si area of 0.283 × 0.682 mm² . In addition, we confirmed that the figure of merit (FOM) of 183.8 in our design is competitive with that of other LC-VCOs that were fabricated using the RF option and designed with conventional inductors.