A Low-Complexity and Energy-Efficient IR- UWB Pulse Generator in 0.18μm technology

A low-power and low-complexity impulse radio ultra-wideband (IR-UWB) pulse generator is presented in the paper. The tunable architecture is composed of a data and clock synchronization block, a controlled glitch generator, an adjustable two-stage buffer, and a pulse shaping filter. The generator has ability of the power spectral density (PSD) peak and central frequency adjustment. This is accomplished by varying the duration of the very short pulse produced by the glitch generator and changing the slope of the signal edges when passing through the buffer. This allows control in the output signal duration and amplitude (proportional to the slope of the signal at the pulse shaping filter input) determining the PSD value and -10 dB bandwidth. The pulse generator is designed and simulated in low-cost 0.18 μm UMC CMOS technology. The simulation results show 403 mV peak-to-peak amplitude and the pulse width of 0.6 ns. The PSD occupies bandwidth from 3 GHz to 7.8 GHz and fully complies with the corresponding FCC spectral mask. The IR-UWB generator supports OOK modulation with an area of 0.63 mm2. It has low power consumption of 1.3 mW corresponding to energy consumption of 13 pJ per pulse for 100 MHz pulse repetition frequency (PRF).