Experimental Investigation of Decoupling Effect on the Nonlinearity of Power Amplifiers in Transmitter Array

Authors

  • Fangyun Peng School of Information and Communications Engineering Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, China
  • Fei Yang China Academy of Space Technology Xi’an, 711049, China
  • Bo Liu School of Information and Communications Engineering Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, China
  • Xiaoming Chen School of Information and Communications Engineering Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, China

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.13052/2023.ACES.J.380102

Keywords:

mutual coupling, nonlinearity, power amplifier, transmitter array

Abstract

In a practical compact massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) transmitter array, each antenna or subarray is connected to an independent power amplifier (PA) with a modest power capacity in order to avoid the challenging demand of high-power capacity of a single PA for the whole array and to facilitate the power dissipation of the transmitter array. In this case, there is simply not enough space for an isolator between the antenna and the PA. As a result, the array mutual coupling changes the load impedances of the PAs and thus further increases the MIMO transmitter’s nonlinearity. In this work, the decoupling effect on the transmitter array’s linearity is investigated experimentally by using an array prototype with PAs. The mutual coupling of the array can be effectively suppressed using a hybrid decoupling structure. Two continuous-wave (CW) signals at different frequencies are injected into the PAs, and the output signal of each PA is measured via a coupler. The measured results show that with effective mutual coupling reduction, the PA interference is greatly suppressed by up to 16 db and the amplitude of the desired signal is enhanced by up to 10 db.

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Author Biographies

Fangyun Peng, School of Information and Communications Engineering Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, China

Fangyun Peng received her B.Sc. degree in Electrical Information Engineering from Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, China, in 2018. She is currently pursuing a Ph.D. degree at the School of Electronic and Information Engineering from Xi’an Jiaotong University. Her research interests include over-the-air testing.

Fei Yang, China Academy of Space Technology Xi’an, 711049, China

Fei Yang is with the China Academy of Space Technology.

Bo Liu, School of Information and Communications Engineering Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, China

Bo Liu received his B.Sc. degree in Electronic Information Engineering from Xidian University, Xi’an, China, in 2019. He received his M.Sc. degree from the School of Electronic and Information Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, China, in 2022. His research interests include MIMO antennas and the decoupling of MIMO antennas.

Xiaoming Chen, School of Information and Communications Engineering Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, China

Xiaoming Chen received his B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi’an, China, in 2006, and M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden, in 2007 and 2012, respectively. From 2013 to 2014, he was a postdoctoral researcher at that same university. From 2014 to 2017, he was with Qamcom Research & Technology AB, Gothenburg, Sweden. Since 2017, he has been a professor at Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, China. His research areas include MIMO antennas, over-the-air testing, reverberation chambers and has published more than 150 journal articles on these topics.

Prof. Chen currently serves as a Senior Associate Editor for IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters. He was the general chair of the IEEE International Conference on Electronic Information and Communication Technology (ICEICT) in 2021. He won the first prize of the universities’ scientific research results in Shaanxi province, China, 2022. He received the IEEE outstanding Associate Editor awards in 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, and the URSI (International Union of Radio Science) Young Scientist Award 2017 and 2018.

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Published

2023-01-31

How to Cite

[1]
F. . Peng, F. . Yang, B. . Liu, and X. . Chen, “Experimental Investigation of Decoupling Effect on the Nonlinearity of Power Amplifiers in Transmitter Array”, ACES Journal, vol. 38, no. 01, pp. 7–14, Jan. 2023.

Issue

2023: Vol 38 Iss 1

Section

Antennas, Metasurfaces, and Testing Methodologies for 5G/6G Communication