The wireless market is developing very fast today with a steadily increasing number of users all around the world. An increasing number of users and the constant need for higher and higher data rates have led to an increasing number of emerging wireless communication standards. As a result there is a huge demand for flexible and low-cost radio architectures for portable applications. Moving towards multistandard radio, a high level of integration becomes a necessity and can only be accomplished by new improved radio architectures and full utilization of technology scaling. Modern nanometer CMOS technologies have the required performance for making high-performance RF circuits together with advanced digital signal processing. This is necessary for the development of low-cost highly integrated multistandard radios. The ultimate solution for the future is a software-defined radio, where a single hardware is used that can be reconfigured by software to handle any standard. Direct analog-to-digital conversion could be used for that purpose, but is not yet feasible due to the extremely tough requirements that put on the analog-to-digital converter (ADC). Meanwhile, the goal is to create radios that are as flexible as possible with today’s technology. The key to success is to have an RF front-end architecture that is flexible enough without putting too tough requirements on the ADC. One of the key components in such a radio front-end is a multiband multistandard low-noise amplifier (LNA). The LNA must be capable of handling several carrier frequencies within a large bandwidth. Therefore it is not possible to optimize the circuit performance for just one frequency band as can be done for a single application LNA. Two different circuit topologies that are suitable for multiband multistandard LNAs have been investigated, implemented, and measured. Those two LNA topologies are: (i) wideband LNAs that cover all the frequency bands of interest (ii) tunable narrowband LNAs that are tunable over a wide range of frequency bands. Before analog-to-digital conversion the RF signal has to be downconverted to a frequency manageable by the analog-to-digital converter. Recently the concept of direct sampling of the RF signal and discrete-time signal processing before analog-to-digital conversion has drawn a lot of attention. Today’s CMOS technologies demonstrate very high speeds, making the RF-sampling technique appealing in a context of multistandard operation at GHz frequencies. In this thesis the concept of RF sampling and decimation is used to implement a flexible RF front-end, where the RF signal is sampled and downconverted to baseband frequency. A discrete-time switched-capacitor filter is used for filtering and decimation in order to decrease the sample rate from a value close to the carrier frequency to a value suitable for analog-to-digital conversion. To demonstrate the feasibility of this approach an RF-sampling front-end primarily intended for WLAN has been implemented in a 0.13 μm CMOS process.

Ce mémoire fait tout d’abord l’état de l’art des filtres reconfigurables (passifs et actifs) pour les radiocommunications. Les différentes architectures de réception sont comparées pour déterminer celles qui sont les mieux adaptées aux récepteurs de type multistandard. Les concepts de radio logicielle et de radio cognitive ainsi que la façon de les mettre en œuvre sont ensuite indiqués afin de souligner l’intérêt d’utiliser des filtres reconfigurables. Les notions de filtres réglables, reconfigurables et agiles qui sont alors comparées illustrent tout l’intérêt des filtres agiles. Une nouvelle théorie qui permet pour la première fois la réalisation de filtres passe bande du second ordre entièrement actifs à fréquence agile est ensuite introduite. Un amplificateur de contre réaction dont le gain est réglable permet de modifier facilement la valeur de la fréquence centrale du filtre obtenu. Cette théorie est ensuite généralisée et ses nouvelles propriétés sont étudiées. Il en résulte alors une plage de réglage de la fréquence beaucoup plus étendue. Des filtres passe bande ont été réalisés en mode courant en technologie SiGe BiCMOS 0.25 µm de STMicroelectroincs à partir de convoyeurs de courant contrôlés (CCCII). Les résultats de simulation obtenus pour ces différents filtres confirment les avantages de cette théorie. Ils montrent ainsi que la généralisation précédente conduit à des structures entièrement actives dont la plage de réglage de la fréquence augmente et la puissance dissipée diminue. Des résultats de mesure obtenus sous pointes pour un filtre passe bande réalisé dans la technologie précédente sont donnés. Ils sont aussi en parfait accord avec cette théorie. Cette nouvelle approche permettra de réaliser des filtres agiles pour les récepteurs multistandard de radiocommunication. / In this thesis, we explore the state of the art of reconfigurable filters (passive and active) used in radio-communications. Different receiving architectures are compared to determine the most suitable for multi-standard devices. The concept of software and cognitive radio as well as the means to implement them are indicated in order to highlight the advantage of reconfigurable filters. The concepts of tunable, reconfigurable and agile filters are compared, illustrating the advantage agile ones. A new theory which allows, for the first time, the realization of second order band-pass fully active filters is then introduced. A feedback amplifier with tunable gain allows modifying easily the center frequency of the resulting filter; this theory is then generalized and its new properties are studied. This results in a large frequency tuning range. Current mode band-pass filters are implemented in SiGe BiCMOS 0.25 µm from STMicroelectroincs using current controlled conveyors (CCCII), the simulation results confirm the interest of this theory. They also show that the generalization leads to entirely active structures whose tuning range increases while its power dissipation decreases. The measurements carried out on the fabricated chip are given; they are in perfect agreement with this theory. The new approach allows realizing agile filters for multi-standard radio-communication receivers.