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Kenneth V. Buer, Gilbert US

Kenneth V. Buer, Gilbert, AZ US

Patent application numberDescriptionPublished
20080231374POWER EFFICIENT MULTISTAGE AMPLIFIER AND DESIGN METHOD - A multistage amplifier and design method are disclosed. The multistage amplifier has a plurality of amplifier stages, each stage having an amplifier designed and biased to operate at or near the amplifier's power added efficiency (PAE) peak. The PAE peak of each of the amplifier is at or near the amplifiers linear-compression transition region, providing a multistage power amplifier that is power efficient and has desirable amplitude to amplitude and amplitude to phase power transfer characteristics. The amplifier is designed by matching the output impedance of a final stage with a load. Amplifier stages are iteratively designed from the last stage to the first. At each stage, an amplifier and drive circuit are designed. The drive circuit and amplifier are designed to provide each stage with output impedance matched to the input impedance of the following stage and to operate at or near the PAE peak of the amplifier.09-25-2008
20090009404Feed Assembly for Dual-Band Transmit-Receive Antenna - A Ka/Ku-band transmitter-receiver comprises a tri-band feed of a Ka-band transceiver, in conjunction with an array of phase combined patch receiving, antennas that operate at the Ku-band frequencies.01-08-2009
20090103596IF INTERFACE - Systems, devices, and methods may be provided for communicating telemetry signals between a satellite modem and transceiver over an IF receive link. In an exemplary embodiment, a communication system comprises a modem, a transceiver, an IF receive communication link coupling the modem and the transceiver and configured to allow IF communication between the modem and the transceiver, and a transceiver interface module and a modem interface module, wherein the modules are configured to allow telemetry communication between the modem and the transceiver over the IF receive communication link.04-23-2009
20090146745NOISE REDUCING DIELECTRIC RESONATOR OSCILLATOR - Systems, devices, and methods are provided for reducing noise in communication systems. An example resonator system comprises: a housing comprising a top portion and a floor portion, a dielectric resonator positioned with the housing, a substrate, and a stripline transmission line adjacent the substrate. In this exemplary embodiment, the stripline transmission line within the housing is electromagnetically coupled to the dielectric resonator, the substrate is positioned away from the floor portion and top portion of the housing, and the dielectric resonator coupled with the suspended stripline transmission line is connected to an active device to form an oscillator. The positioning of the substrate relative to the housing may reduce the amount of the electromagnetic field from the stripline transmission line that is absorbed into the housing. In a further embodiment, the board has no metallic backing on at least a portion of the back of the board.06-11-2009
20090149150SYSTEMS, DEVICES, AND METHODS FOR SUPPRESSING FREQUENCY SPURS IN MIXERS - Systems, devices and methods are disclosed for suppressing the 2LO frequency spur, output from a mixer. In various exemplary embodiments, a DC bias circuit is electrically connected to provide DC bias to one or more non-linear elements of the mixer. The biasing voltage is used to cause the current-voltage characteristics and/or junction capacitances between non-linear elements to be more symmetric and/or to suppress 2LO leakage currents that form 2LO frequency spurs at the output of the mixer. The non-linear elements may comprise one of: BJT's, diodes, and FET's. The mixer may be one of: a subharmonic mixer; a fundamental resistive mixer; a fundamental subharmonic transconductance mixer; and a fundamental transconductance mixer comprising an anti-parallel diode pair. The system may further be configured to automatically determine an appropriate DC bias voltage level that will improve one of the LO-IF isolation and the LO-RF isolation.06-11-2009
20090174042RADIO FREQUENCY OVER-MOLDED LEADFRAME PACKAGE - An over-molded leadframe (e.g., a Quad Flat No-lead (QFN)) package capable of operating at frequencies in the range of about five gigahertz (GHz) to about 300 GHz and a method of making the over-molded leadframe package are disclosed. The over-molded leadframe package includes a capacitance lead configured to substantially reduce and/or offset the inductance created by one or more wirebonds used to connect an integrated circuit (IC) chip on the package to an input/output (I/O) lead. The IC chip is connected to the capacitance lead via one or more wirebonds, and the capacitance lead is then connected to the I/O lead via at least a second wirebond. Thus, inductance created by the one or more wirebonds on the package is substantially reduced and/or offset by the capacitance lead prior to a signal being output by the package and/or received by the IC chip.07-09-2009
20090203328METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR RF COMMUNICATION SYSTEM SIGNAL TO NOISE RATIO IMPROVEMENT - The signal to noise ratio performance of a RF communication system can be improved by providing resistance to transmitter self-jamming and eliminating or reducing the need for a transmit rejection filter or other measures such as limiters or blanking switches. An anti-jam low noise amplifier provides enough rejection and jamming immunity to reduce or eliminate the need for the transmit reject filter. Thus, the system noise performance is improved by eliminating the filter and the associated losses which cause signal to noise ratio performance degradation.08-13-2009
20090206473System and Method for Integrated Waveguide Packaging - A millimeter wave system or package may include at least one printed wiring board (PWB), at least one integrated waveguide interface, and at least one monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC). The package may be assembled in panel form incorporating parallel manufacturing techniques.08-20-2009
20090219111PHASE SHIFTER WITH FLEXIBLE CONTROL VOLTAGE - The invention provides a phase shifter with flexible control voltage that is useful with all RF systems that phase shift a RF signal. The phase shifter according to the present invention may comprise transistors used as switching elements. In one aspect, the phase shifter provides the option of controlling a phase shifter with either a positive or a negative voltage control signal. For example, the dc ground of the transistors included in the phase shifter may be floated, either fixed or adjusted. The RF grounding of the transistors may be achieved by in-band resonant capacitors. Thus, the control voltage provided to the transistors is flexible in that it may be connected to a positive or negative control voltage, or it may be connected to ground, or it may swing from a positive control voltage to a negative control voltage or vice versa.09-03-2009
20090219112PHASE SHIFTER WITH FLEXIBLE CONTROL VOLTAGE - The invention provides a phase shifter with flexible control voltage that is useful with all RF systems that phase shift a RF signal. The phase shifter according to the present invention may comprise transistors used as switching elements. In one aspect, the phase shifter provides the option of controlling a phase shifter with either a positive or a negative voltage control signal. For example, the dc ground of the transistors included in the phase shifter may be floated, either fixed or adjusted. The RF grounding of the transistors may be achieved by in-band resonant capacitors. Thus, the control voltage provided to the transistors is flexible in that it may be connected to a positive or negative control voltage, or it may be connected to ground, or it may swing from a positive control voltage to a negative control voltage or vice versa.09-03-2009
20090295487POWER EFFICIENT MULTISTAGE AMPLIFIER AND DESIGN METHOD - A multistage amplifier and design method are disclosed. The multistage amplifier has a plurality of amplifier stages, each stage having an amplifier designed and biased to operate at or near the amplifier's power added efficiency (PAE) peak. The PAE peak of each of the amplifier is at or near the amplifiers linear-compression transition region, providing a multistage power amplifier that is power efficient and has desirable amplitude to amplitude and amplitude to phase power transfer characteristics. The amplifier is designed by matching the output impedance of a final stage with a load. Amplifier stages are iteratively designed from the last stage to the first. At each stage, an amplifier and drive circuit are designed. The drive circuit and amplifier are designed to provide each stage with output impedance matched to the input impedance of the following stage and to operate at or near the PAE peak of the amplifier.12-03-2009
20090323786METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR IDENTIFYING AND SELECTING PROPER CABLE CONNECTIONS - In accordance with an exemplary embodiment, a system comprises a first electrical component, a second electrical component, and at least two cables connecting the first and second electrical components. Time varying signals are transmitted through the cables with at least one of the cables carrying an injected DC signal. The system associates the cable carrying the DC signal with a predetermined time varying signal and is capable of electronically switching the routes of the time varying signals if the cables are incorrectly physically attached to the first and second electrical components.12-31-2009
20100112961SINGLE OSCILLATOR TRANSCEIVER - A frequency plan is provided for particular use in a transceiver. Advantageously, a single oscillator may be used to generate desired frequency signals. One or more power splitters receive the signal and equally divide the signal into first and second signals having a frequency substantially equal to the original. Multipliers on each arm of the transceiver receive a signal and increase the frequency of the signal. In one exemplary embodiment, multiple signals having different frequencies may be transmitted over the same cable due in part to the generated frequency separation between the signals. In another exemplary embodiment, multiple signals may be transmitted over multiple cables. In another exemplary embodiment, the frequency plan may self correct a transmit signal based on a reference signal, such as the receive signal. Additionally, multiple signals over one or more cables may be transmitted at or below 3 GHz.05-06-2010
20100117693DUAL CONVERSION TRANSMITTER WITH SINGLE LOCAL OSCILLATOR - The present disclosure relates to systems, devices and methods related to transmitters, and/or transceivers having a single, tunable oscillator in a dual conversion architecture. In various exemplary embodiments, this transmitter may include: a first mixer configured to receive a first oscillator signal from the single oscillator; a filter configured to band pass filter the converted signal and output a filtered signal; and a second mixer in communication with the filter, configured to receive the filtered signal. This dual conversion transmitter may be configured to receive a communication signal from an input to the transmitter and to output a converted signal based on the first oscillator signal and the communication signal. The second mixer may be configured to receive a scaled version of the first oscillator signal and to output a desired frequency output signal based on the scaled version of the first oscillator signal and the filtered signal.05-13-2010
20100246153FLIP-CHIP FET CELL - A method and system for a FET cell is presented. The FET cell includes multiple individual transistors and interconnect bumps that are configured to flip-chip connect to a substrate. The substrate may have the majority of a matching structure for the FET cell. Furthermore, the FET cell may include a stability circuit in communication with the terminals of the individual transistors and further in communication with the interconnect bumps. Additionally, different materials can be used in combination in the FET cell and the separate substrate having the majority of the matching structure. Various materials may be more efficiency used in a FET cell, while other materials are suitable for the separate substrate.09-30-2010
20100259445ACTIVE PHASED ARRAY ARCHITECTURE - In an exemplary embodiment, a phased array solid-state architecture has dual-polarized feeds and is manufactured, for example, on highly flexible silicon germanium (SiGe). The implementation of dual-polarized feeds facilitates the operation of phased arrays where the polarization can be statically or dynamically controlled on a subarray or element basis. In an exemplary embodiment, the sub-component control is configured to optimize a performance characteristic associated with polarization, such as phase or amplitude adjustment. An active phased array architecture may replace traditional distributed and GaAs implementations for the necessary functions required to operate electronically steerable phased array antennas. The architecture combines active versions of vector generators, power splitters, power combiners, and RF hybrids in a novel fashion to realize a fully or substantially monolithic solution for a wide range of antenna applications that can be realized with radiating elements having single-polarized or dual-polarized feeds.10-14-2010
20100285758INTEGRATED ORTHOMODE TRANSDUCER - A method and system for an integrated transceiver is presented. The integrated transceiver includes a transceiver housing, where a waveguide is formed inside the transceiver housing using a housing base and a sub-floor component. Neither the housing base nor the sub-floor component alone is configured to operate as a waveguide. In an exemplary embodiment, a portion of the waveguide is cast into the housing base and is part of the transceiver housing. Furthermore, in an exemplary embodiment, an antenna system includes a feed horn, a polarizer, the integrated transceiver, and a transceiver circuit that communicates with the waveguide to transmit and receive radio frequency signals. The integrated transceiver, in the exemplary embodiment, includes a transceiver housing base that forms a portion of an integrated waveguide assembly, and another portion of the integrated waveguide assembly aligns with the transceiver housing base to form the integrated waveguide assembly.11-11-2010
20110075714SINGLE OSCILLATOR TRANSCEIVER - A frequency plan is provided for particular use in a transceiver. Advantageously, a single oscillator may be used to generate desired frequency signals. One or more power splitters receive the signal and equally divide the signal into first and second signals having a frequency substantially equal to the original. Multipliers on each arm of the transceiver receive a signal and increase the frequency of the signal. In one exemplary embodiment, multiple signals having different frequencies may be transmitted over the same cable due in part to the generated frequency separation between the signals. In another exemplary embodiment, multiple signals may be transmitted over multiple cables. Additionally, multiple signals over one or more cables may be transmitted at or below 03-31-2011
20110102074PROGRAMMABLE RF ARRAY - The present disclosure relates to radio frequency integrated circuits. More particularly, systems, devices and methods related to field programmable, software implemented, radio frequency integrated circuits are disclosed. In accordance with an exemplary embodiment, a field programmable, software implemented, radio frequency integrated circuit may comprise a high frequency IF embodiment. An input signal may be up converted to a high frequency, such as 60 GHz. Next, the amplitude and/or phase may be adjusted as desired. Subsequently, the signal may be down converted.05-05-2011
20110109501AUTOMATED BEAM PEAKING SATELLITE GROUND TERMINAL - This disclosure may relate generally to systems, devices, and methods for a phased array illuminated reflector dish RF antenna combining a phased array with a microwave reflector dish and using beam steering to align the antenna beam to maximize antenna performance. The phased array may be connected in communication with one of a transmitter, a receiver, and a transceiver. In various exemplary embodiments the phased array illuminated reflector dish RF antenna includes a boom arm supporting the microwave reflector dish and the phased array. In one exemplary embodiment, the phased array only communicates signals with a remote source of the signals via the microwave reflector dish (not directly). The RF antenna system may be configured to be rough pointed by mechanically aiming the RF antenna system, and the RF antenna system is configured to fine tune aim the beam of said RF antenna system by beam steering.05-12-2011
20110109520ELECTROMECHANICAL POLARIZATION SWITCH - In accordance with various aspects of the present invention, a method and system for electro-mechanical polarization switching in an antenna system is presented. The antenna system may comprise an integrated waveguide in a transceiver housing, where the waveguide has at least four channels. In an exemplary embodiment, a sliding switch is incorporated into the waveguide. The sliding switch is configured to switch the polarization of the antenna system by physically realigning the waveguide channels. The sliding switch may be electro-magnetically controlled. Furthermore, the polarization switching may be performed to assist in load balancing for a particular frequency and/or polarization combination.05-12-2011

Patent applications by Kenneth V. Buer, Gilbert, AZ US