Overview >>                      EASY-A

 

The Objective The project goal is the developement of wireless communication systems using the 60-GHz band. In this frequency band new techniques like beamforming or antenna diversity will be investigated. The integration of this 60-GHz technology into other radio standards will be explored.
Because of the different requirement profiles for 60-GHz applications different modulation techniques will be required too. (1) For short-distance-systems with a maximum of 1 meter a line-of-sight-connection without multi path effects can be assumed. In this case simple single-carrier-techniques can be used. (2) For longdistance-systems multi path effects have to be accounted for, so more complex techniques like OFDM shall be the better choice. The goal of IHP is to develop a chip set, which covers different transmission-modes.
To reach the extreme high data rates of some GBit/s, new techniques and architectures become necessary for analog front-end (AFE), baseband (BB) and media-access-control (MAC). Higher integration of these components will reduce the manufacturing costs. IHP's own SiGe:C-BiCMOS technology is extremely well suited for this purpose.
The project results will be used in the corresponding standards. Currently IHP contributes actively to the 60-GHz-standardization within IEEE802.15.3c.

IHP’s Contribution - High integration of front-end chips to decrease the system costs.
- Different modulation techniques on a single chip.
- Improve the signal-noise-ratio and the phase-noise.
- Reduce the energy consumption of the analog components for mobile applications.
- Improve the yield of analog chips by using digital controlled units.
- Investigate the technical feasibility of beamforming techniques; design of the active
  components for phasecontrolled patch-antenna-arrays.
- Develop and implement efficient baseband processors covering different modulation
  techniques.
- Develop and implement efficient protocoll processors with high data-throughput.
- Support sectorized antennas by the MAC protocol.
- Support the combination of 60-GHz-systems with other radio techniques like UWB or
  IEEE802.11n.

Funding The project is founded by BMBF (FKZ: 01BU0800).

Project Partners BMW Group Research and Technology, European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company, Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Solid State Physics, IMST GmbH, Infineon Technologies AG, MEDAV GmbH, MEYTEC GmbH Infomationssysteme, Siemens AG, TES Electronic Solutions, Technical University of Dresden, TELEFUNKEN Semiconductors GmbH & Co. KG, Ulm University

Selected Publications - Chang-Soon Choi, et al., 60GHz OFDM hardware demonstrators in SiGe BiCMOS: state-of-the art and future development, in Proc. IEEE International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communication (IEEE PIMRC), Cannes, France, Sep., 2008.

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