Workshops

According to the latest report by Global Market Insights Inc. the market valuation of optical communication and networking will cross $30 billion by 2027. The significant revenue comes from the emerging technologies such as IoT (Internet of things), machine-to-machine networks, AI, cloud-based services, and web-based applications. Several innovations are underway to enhance the wireline and optical transceiver designs so that they can serve the increase in demand and future generations of applications.

Increasing demand for high data rates, reduced latency, and increased device density are driving the development of 5G wireless systems. 5G spectrum is presently covering sub-7GHz (FR1) and mm-wave bands (FR2, FR3,…). This workshop will bring together experts from academia and industry to highlight recent works and performance trends related to 5G-FR1 Power Amplifiers (PAs) and Front-End Modules (FEMs). Multiband and high linearity requirements, along with the need for higher power and reduced power consumption, make the design of 5G-FR1 PA and FEM highly challenging and critical to overall system performance. Recent trends in Doherty, class F/F-1, multi-stage PAs, and Envelope Tracking PA architectures will be highlighted and insights into different design techniques and integration technologies (CMOS, SOI, GaN) will be presented as pathways to enable the integration of future PAs and FEMs. An introduction to emerging heterogeneous technologies combining high-power GaN with CMOS will also provide the attendees with new directions for next-generation PA design and integration.

The human body is a new playground for wireless communications to connect health devices or open new services related to information exchange or security. It faces many constraints such as power consumption, quality of service, reliability, and of course being compatible with the human body. The last decade has seen several innovations that exploit the body as a medium to propagate the information efficiently. This workshop proposes a state-of-the-art of up-to-date research on the topic. It starts with an overview of body area networks and pioneering research on communications and power delivery through the body. It is followed by recent developments on broadband human-body communication transceivers for wearable health monitoring. Then, surface-wave capacitive body-coupled communications are introduced and challenges for upper layers and synchronization of nodes are addressed. Finally, intra-body communications using ultrasounds are explored to complete the scope of this workshop.

Wireless networks have fueled socio-economic growth worldwide and are expected to further advance to enable new applications such as autonomous vehicles, virtual/augmented-reality, and smart cities. Due to shortage of sub-6GHz spectrum, mm-wave frequencies play an important role in the emerging 6G and the communication-on-the-move applications. Given that the propagation loss in the lower mm-wave band needs to be compensated by antenna array gain and densification of base stations with cell radius as small as a hundred meters, radio chipsets need to be power and cost efficient. To make radio chipsets power and cost efficient, state-of-the-art mm-wave-net transceivers are designed with phased antenna array (PAA). As a consequence, signal processing techniques and network protocols for mm-wave-nets are designed under constraints of PAA architectures. Future generations of mm-wave-nets will operate in the upper mm-wave frequency band where more than 10GHz bandwidth can be used to meet the ever-increasing demands. Their realization will demand addressing a completely new set of challenges including wider bandwidths, larger antenna array size, and higher cell density. These new system requirements demand fundamental rethinking of radio architectures, signal processing and networking protocols. Major breakthroughs are thus required in radio front-end architectures to enable coherent combining of wideband mm-wave spectrum, as most commonly adopted PAA-based radios face many challenges in achieving fast beam training, interference suppression, and wideband data communication. Through this workshop, we will look at the fundamental issue of coherent signal combination at these large scales from sub-GHz to sub-THz enabled by a diverse group of speakers with expertise spanning circuits, architecture, algorithms, and applications. The coherent combination will bring out true-time-delay array architectures including recent developments in wideband delay compensation methods with large range-to-resolution ratios. The delay compensation at different points of the receiver chain including RF, baseband, and digital will empower not only traditional wireless communications but also spatial signal processing for direction finding and interference suppression.

5G and future 6G wireless communications have an objective to massively deploy IoT sensors everywhere; this is important for smart cities, health sensors, space exploration and so on. In this workshop the combination of wireless power transmission, wireless communications and energy harvesting will be presented with clear applications in several use cases. Academics around the world and industry will be presenting their latest developments.

Utilizing mm-waves in mobile communications has been known to be associated with much lower radiation powers and much shorter communication ranges. This has given rise to what are called “Microcells” and “Picocells”, whose coverage areas do not exceed a few meters. These cells are responsible for the communication with the User Equipment (UE). Their backhaul communications with high-power Base Stations (BS) are either wired (usually fiber-optical) or in a Line-of-Sight (LOS) scenario. LOS wireless communications do not involve wave-matter interactions, as any LOS obstacle heavily deteriorates the communication quality. Health aspects of 5G and beyond is therefore limited to the extremely low-power short-range Picocell-UE communication. Another related relevant aspect is the very strong mm-wave attenuation in water-rich substances characterizing biological tissues. mm-Waves cannot therefore penetrate into biological objects (eg human and animal bodies and plants) more than few millimeters. Health aspects must therefore be investigated within the skin area. Deeper inside the body, mm-waves assume negligible intensities, which are much safer than those of earlier standards (eg 3G and 4G). A group of very competent scientists will talk at this workshop. These represent standardization institutions, academic scientists involved in health issues of electromagnetic radiations, and physicists, who can qualitatively estimate the in-vivo radiation levels and the electromagnetic loss mechanisms dominating the wave-matter interactions in biological substances. The expected results should be very calming for the public, as it will be shown that the major standards (eg ICNIRP, IEEE, and ANSI) allow for harmless radiation levels, and this has been justified by the long-time experience with man-made radiation in the last decades (broadcasting and different wireless communication modalities). It will also be shown that social-media widely-spread views of pseudoscience and conspiracy theorists claiming serious health hazards, which are caused generally by mm-wave radiation and particularly as related to 5G and beyond, are clearly BASELESS. To a great extent, these claims are based on mixing up ionizing and nonionizing radiation. The mechanisms of wave-matter interactions in the latter are fully described by the constitutive parameters: permittivity, permeability, and conductivity for weak and moderate field intensities that do not involve nonlinearities. These are macroscopic quantities (spatial moving averages) that average out spatial microscopic details. The averaging window is at most a few hundredths of wavelength wide. Possible changes in critical and sensitive atomic or molecular structures (similar to that existing in eg DNA or nerve cells) cannot considerably exceed the macroscopic average. The latter is a reversible thermal one, as long as the radiated power levels do not exceed those dictated by the Regulatory Agencies (eg FCC in USA).

Telecom communities are beginning to prepare the next generation of mobile telecom, the 6G, and present KPIs going to the Tbps, 300GHz carrier frequency, space multiplexing, spectrum agility, dense Massive MIMO, wide bands, and so forth. Serving these challenges, microelectronics communities must re-think their medium term roadmap: what role can CMOS processes play? Is SiGe HBT a good answer to these KPIs? Do we need more exotic technologies such as III-V HBT or HEMT? How to do Heterogeneous Integrations, in a 3D approach? How to integrate antennas and passives?

The Power Amplifier (PA) continues to be a critical building block in mm-wave communication systems, often dictating the overall system efficiency and can thereby impose constraints on system deployment (eg max phased-array size due to thermal constraints). As such, many publications focus on efficiency enhancement techniques for mm-wave power amplifiers. However, when used in systems targeting “5G and Beyond” applications, transceiver bandwidths must be suitable to meet the high data-rate specifications, and hence, maximum PA efficiency cannot be blindly pursued. Instead, efficiency enhancement techniques must be explored in close consideration of their implications on bandwidth which is what this workshop aims to explore more deeply. The goal of this workshop is three-fold: 1) familiarize the audience with PA specifications required for next-gen applications, 2) review well-known (and emerging) efficiency enhancement techniques for mm-wave PAs with perspectives on attainable bandwidth, and 3) discuss techniques to enhance bandwidth while maintaining adequate efficiency required for practical systems. The workshop features talks which will highlight PA specifications for two of the forefront “5G and Beyond” applications — radar and large-scale phased-arrays — covering the 20–100+ GHz, along with reference designs suitable for such applications. In addition, there will discussion on design methodologies for maximizing bandwidth while optimizing efficiency in the context of mm-wave and sub-THz linear amplifiers and mm-wave Doherty amplifiers. Lastly, an emerging efficiency enhancement technique, the sub-harmonic switching amplifier, will also be presented.

Quantum computers hold the promise to perform certain complex calculations that are not solvable even with today’s most powerful supercomputers. But despite the significant progress made in the last decade in the science and engineering of quantum computation systems, several challenges remain to be overcome before quantum computation can become practically usable. A key challenge relates to system scalability — fault-tolerant quantum computation will likely require thousands or millions of quantum bits (qubits), far beyond the capacity of current prototypes. Today’s most prominent candidate for implementing large-scale systems, the superconducting qubit platform, operates in the microwave regime and is controlled and readout via conventional microwave electronics operating at room temperature. While the current room temperature control and readout approach works for small-scale experiments, it is not scalable to thousands or millions of qubits. The engineering challenges of realizing practical large-scale systems present quantum microwave engineers with new opportunities in microwave modeling, design, and characterization of cryogenic semiconductor and superconductor devices, circuits, and systems. This workshop will address emerging techniques and technologies for quantum information processing including low-temperature measurements and calibrations, cryogenic packaging and interconnects, monolithic semiconductor-based quantum processors, and quantum-classical interfaces based on cryogenic CMOS and Josephson superconductive electronics.

With recent 5G deployment underway, the focus of wireless research is shifting toward 6G, which is expected to have a peak data rate of 1Tb/s and air latency less than 100 microseconds, 50 times the peak data rate and one-tenth the latency of 5G. To achieve Tb/s transmissions in 6G, it is inevitable to utilize the frequency band over 100GHz or sub-THz due to enormous amount of available bandwidth. However, the use of such high frequency bands results in more design challenges of RF circuits including output power, noise, linearity, signal conversion, and high-quality signal source for 6G communications and sensing. In addition, the optimal phased array architecture needs to be carefully analyzed such that the compact and energy-efficient system package can be attained. Moreover, to compensate for the severe mm-wave or sub-THz path loss, a large number of phased array is required to enhance EIRP and SNR while appropriate designs are necessary to establish reliable wireless links and ensure the array performance. Failure in any of these will prevent us from moving forward regarding the development of 6G. In this workshop, the main theme to be discussed concentrates on mm-wave design challenges and solutions for 6G wireless communications, especially targeting RF circuits. The workshop starts with an overview of mm-wave 6G to illustrate the whole picture to the audience. Afterwards, the RF design challenges based on silicon technologies to realize 6G systems are paid more attention while the innovative design techniques are provided such that the advantages of low cost and high-level integration in silicon can be still obtained. For in-depth exploration, being a critical building block in RF front-ends, mm-wave and sub-THz PA is specially under discussion to investigate the design bottlenecks as well as technology limitations, and the potential solutions and technology directions are presented. Besides RF designs, the analysis of phased-array architecture suitable for 6G applications is mentioned while the analog and digital beamforming structures are compared. In this workshop, to overcome the hurdles arising from silicon technologies, a new silicon-compatible III-V technology is introduced to facilitate 6G RF front-end designs. This workshop also covers the mm-wave and sub-THz communication and sensing systems from the top-down perspective for the comprehensive demonstration of 6G realization.

The amount of sensing applications at mm-wave frequencies is continuously growing. Most of the applications can be addressed by classical radar techniques, but not all. Additional types of novel energy efficient sensing concepts for near-field imaging arrays and spectroscopy are being investigated. This full-day workshop covers near-field sensing and advanced state of the art radar techniques at mm-wave and THz frequencies. The intention is to showcase the unique applications and innovative concepts for sensing different materials and parameters including vital signs, small motions and distances, permittivity, humidity and gas density, and biomolecules using mm-wave to THz frequencies. The first half of the workshop will focus on various solutions for mm-wave and THz imaging and spectroscopy. For example, real-time THz super-resolution near-field imaging will be discussed, as well as transceivers at THz for gas spectroscopy. Advantages and disadvantages of various sensing approaches will be discussed. In the second half, we will discuss the latest trends and future directions in mm-wave radar systems. We will focus specifically on novel mm-wave radar modulation schemes, advanced system and circuit realizations. The emphasis is on digital radar modulation techniques, such as OFDM, PMCW, spread-spectrum, and their advantages or disadvantages versus classical FMCW radar realizations. The main idea of the workshop is to give an overview on mm-wave and THz sensing concepts and show the future directions for the advanced mm-wave radar radar transceivers.

Modern transceivers often rely on many discrete components, such as SAW and BAW filters and duplexers, to protect them from interference. The number of these discrete front-end components is expected to grow further as more bands are made available at RF and mm-wave frequencies, limiting the system cost, form factor and flexibility. Also, while integrated self-interference cancellation has been demonstrated, many challenges remain at the antenna interface and scaling to phased-array and MIMO transceivers. In this workshop, experts from academic and industry will present the state-of-the-art interference mitigation approaches that can be applied to integrated wireless transceivers. Finally, the workshop will conclude with an interactive panel discussion about the potential and limitations of integrated interference mitigation.

This workshop will walk you through the steps involved in designing today’s complex radios for applications such as infrastructure cellular, Wi-Fi or mm-wave beam forming arrays from a systems perspective. The workshop caters to students, as well as experienced engineers in the industry, with background in RF systems, circuit design or standards, who are interested in expanding the scope of their knowledge beyond the narrow design tasks they may be exposed to. Attendees will learn how system specifications are derived, how we partition design between RF/Analog/Mixed-signal and digital sections to achieve the most optimum solution in terms of size, power, external BOM. You will hear from speakers who are experts in their areas: a mix from industry and academia. Standards related specification and product level requirements that drive architecture or topology choices will be presented. Using Wi-Fi 802.11be emerging standard as an example, we will outline the salient features and how they compare with previous generations. We will address design considerations imposed by the new standard requirements, with particular focus on RF. Presentations focused on base station cellular transceivers will illustrate the differences between narrow-band (mixer-based) and Direct Sampling/Synthesis approaches. Using microwave and mm-wave point to point communication systems, we will go over design aspects such as line-up analysis to arrive at block level specifications. We will present transmit/receive circuit/system challenges in large-scale arrays, followed by approaches towards realizing scalable, digital-intensive large-scale arrays. Design advances in critical building blocks, such as blocker tolerant receivers and ADPLLs will also be discussed. We will present built-in self-calibration techniques and built-in mitigation of self-interference, leading to reduced production testing costs and high production yields. Calibration techniques to overcome impairments such as IQ error or LO offset calibration and Digital Pre-Distortion (DPD) for linearization of power amplifiers will be discussed.

Wireless proximity communication provides many unique features over conventional wireless communication such as ultra-high data rate, superior data privacy, energy efficiency, mechanical reliability, precision ranging and bandwidth density. However, those unique features always come with many design trade-offs in system complexity, effective communication distance, energy efficiency and system robustness. In this workshop, we are going to go over several wireless proximity communication techniques such as Mid-Field powering and communication for bio-medical implants, impulse ultra-wide-band and mm-wave. The first and second workshops will introduce the applications in latest UWB standard (IEEE 802.15.4z), and the design trade off in commercial UWB SoC system and circuit design. The third workshop will focus on Mid-Field technology for powering and communication with biomedical neuromodulation implants. This technology offers advantages such as significantly smaller, implanted deeper, implant complexity, patient complication and post-surgical pain. The last work workshop presents the overview of solid-state-based mm-wave wireless interconnects from fundamental research to commercialization.

The power amplifiers (PA) and transmitters are the last door in the RF front-end for both the digital and analog kingdoms, one which greatly affects the quality of service (QoS) of the wireless link for modern RF communication, such as 5G, IoT, and beyond. Due to the multi-function trends nowadays, this workshop will showcase the digitally intensive PAs and transmitters, which attract much attention due to their highly reconfigurable nature and rapid development that is on pace with the decreasing scale of CMOS technology. In the first talk, with the aim to powering the next generation of wireless communication, from RF to mm-wave, a series of switched capacitor power amplifiers are discussed. Then, CMOS digital power amplifier and transmitter for efficient signal amplification and beam steering are introduced in the second talk. Next, in the third talk, the all digital transmitter with GaN switching mode power amplifiers with high power efficiency is discussed. Later, digital polar transmitter for impulse-radio ultrawide band communication is introduced in the fourth talk. Finally, the high-performance digital-to-analog converter design towards a digital transmitter is discussed in the fifth talk.

Passive, scientific microwave systems perform crucial functions: providing early warning to massive populations to protect from hurricanes, winter storms, and other natural disasters, and enabling scientific understanding of astronomical phenomena. The recent addition of fifth-generation (5G) wireless into mm-wave spectral bands near those designated for these sensitive scientific observations, and expected future expansion of wireless communications to additional, higher-frequency bands, has jeopardized the fidelity of these sensing operations due to interference. However, wireless communications connects societies across the globe, and is a key driver of global economic stimulation, and as such must continue to expand while ensuring scientific measurements can continue. This workshop will overview both this challenge and new solutions at the microwave circuit and system levels to provide coexistence between active and passive spectrum-use systems. The workshop begins with specific discussions of a roadmap for developing coexistence between passive scientific and 5G wireless systems from the National Science Foundation and European Space Agency, challenges faced by passive systems, and perspectives from the commercial wireless industry. With this background, the next talks highlight microwave circuit and systems innovations that form promising solutions to this problem, including reconfigurable circuit design for 5G wireless systems, artificially intelligent power amplifier arrays, and a spectral broker for coordination between active and passive spectrum systems. The workshop will conclude with a panel session for extensive audience interaction with all speakers.

Phased array communications and radar systems are finding increased use in a variety of applications. This places a greater importance on training engineers and rapidly prototyping new phased array concepts. However, both those imperatives have historically been difficult and expensive. But a recent open source offering, the ADALM-PHASER, allows real beamforming hardware to be used for education, project proposals, and product development. This workshop will introduce that offering with lectures and hands on labs covering: software defined radio (SDR), phased array beamforming (steering angle and beam formation), antenna impairments (side lobes/tapering, grating lobes, beam squint, quantization sidelobes), Monopulse tracking implementation, and simple radar algorithm design. Each of these topics will be addressed with a short lecture, followed by the participants using the ADALM-PHASER hardware to directly explore the lecture topic.

Systems that utilize RF, microwave and mm-wave energy are becoming increasingly important in the commercial medical device world. In the design of new medical devices, the use of high-frequency electromagnetics must be considered. For example, an implant such as a pacemaker should not require surgically-based battery replacement, but should be wirelessly rechargeable. A neurostimulator should be configurable and controllable by a phone or tablet. A vital sign sensor should allow for non-contact measurements to maximize comfort and usability. Wearable medical sensors should stream data wirelessly to a central location for display and analysis by medical professionals. These examples are just a few of the reasons why RF, microwave and mm-wave devices are of increasing importance and can be routinely found in government approved medical devices around the world. As RF, microwave and mm-wave technology rapidly advances in the academic and commercial environment, it will continue to be adapted toward medical applications in new and interesting ways. Please join our panel of industry experts for an interactive discussion about the in-roads that high-frequency approaches have made in the medical device space. Example applications include high-power RF/microwave ablation for cancer and cardiac applications, radar-based vital-sign sensing, in-body or on-body communication systems, wireless-power techniques, and cell detection and characterization. Panelists will share their perspective on both the current state-of-the-art, as well as future applications of this invaluable technology. In addition to technical content, unique considerations for the industry such as clinical study development, the regulatory approval process and the marketing of medical devices will be discussed.

This workshop will focus on recent advances in emerging manufacturing and integration processes for 3D microwave and mm-wave RF filters for the next generation of wireless and satellite communication systems. In particular, the workshop will present new RF design and electromagnetic modeling techniques for new classes of RF filtering components (bandpass/bandstop filters, multi-band filters and multiplexers) based on well-established manufacturing processes such as CNC machining and Si-based microfabrication that enables the realization of RF filters from mm-waves to frequencies in the sub-THz region (eg 700GHz). Furthermore, the workshop will provide an overview of emerging digital additive manufacturing processes such as stereolithography, selective laser sintering for new types of materials such as ceramics, plastics and metals and their application to advanced RF filtering architectures. The potential of these processes for complex geometries as well as for RF filters with advanced RF performance, high-frequency of operation, small form factor and low weight will be discussed in detail. Lastly, the workshop will present new RF design methodologies and novel RF filtering architectures that are uniquely enabled by the manufacturing flexibility of 3D printing that facilitates the realization of unconventional shapes.

There has been a tremendous advance in satellite communications in the past 3 years. First, Starlink (LEO) has sent upwards of 1600 satellites and is now building 5000 user terminals A WEEK (all based on phased-arrays), OneWeb (LEO) has secured $5B of funding and has sent 400 satellites and will be ready for operation in December 2021, Amazon Kuiper is building their LEO constellation as we speak, SES with mPower and their 2000-beam phased-arrays in a MEO constellation can now provide 500 Mbps to thousands of ISP (internet service providers) at the same time, and Viasat and HNS have both launched their GEO Tbps satellites each with 300+ beams. All of these units require advanced phased-arrays on the ground for user terminals and SATCOM-On-the-Move. This workshop will address advances in these low-cost ground terminals and in the LEO/MEO/GEO constellations, and will present the silicon technologies needed for this work.

The extremely crowded and rapidly changing modern spectral environment has significantly increased the demand for highly reconfigurable RF technologies of high performance and small size. While RF switches are key elements in modern wireless communications and defense applications, switch performance has been stagnant for the last decade. With 5G being rapidly implemented and 6G on the horizon, RF systems are moving to the mm-wave bands and the RF loss in fundamental elements such as switches is becoming even more critical. Many commercially available switch technologies have certain issues with at least one of the following: resistive load, capacitive interference, limited bandwidth, low power operation, and/or nonlinearity. Recent work on emerging chalcogenide phase change material (PCM)-based switches has demonstrated a breakthrough innovation and a new class of reconfigurable devices exhibiting high performance, better monolithic and heterogeneous integration capabilities with other switch technologies, exceptional figure of merit, and broadband RF response compared to various commercially available switch technologies. Along with PCMs, metal-insulator transition (MIT) material such as vanadium dioxide based devices have also gained significant interest and researchers around the globe have demonstrated various interesting applications using PCM/MIT including but not limited to tunable mm-wave components, reconfigurable electro-optical components, and resonant sensors. Several research groups and industries are working to mature these technologies for high performance and efficient future wireless systems. This workshop aims to trigger the discussion on emerging PCM/MIT technologies regarding recent innovations, challenges, integration possibilities, limitations, and future trends.

Research and development on mm-wave front-end implementations are expanding to a new frontier beyond 100GHz for emerging 6G communication and radar imaging applications. This proposed workshop covers the latest advancement of packaging and integration technologies for designing and implementing >100GHz front-end modules including in-depth discussions of different substrates, interconnects, antennas, co-design with RFICs, thermal management, system demos/prototypes, and so on. We plan to have 11 experts (5 from university/research institutes; 6 from industry) to present their pioneering works in this area: (1) Prof. Mark Rodwell from UCSB and Director of the SRC/DARPA ComSenTer Wireless Research Center, (2) Dr. Muhammad Furqan from Infineon, (3) Siddhartha Sinha from imec, (4) Dr. Telesphor Kamgaing from Intel, (5) Dr. Alberto Valdes-Garcia from IBM Research, (6) Prof. Wolfgang Heinrich from the Ferdinand-Braun-Institut (FBH), (7) Dr. Augusto Gutierrez-Aitken from Northrop Grumman, (8) Dr. Jon Hacker from Teledyne, (9) Dr. Goutam Chattopadhyay from NASA JPL, (10) Prof. Emmanouil (Manos) M. Tentzeris from Georgia Tech, and (11) Dr. Venkatesh Srinivasan from Texas Instruments.

Many wireless systems could benefit from the ability to transmit and receive on the same frequency at the same time, which is known as in-band full-duplex (IBFD) and/or simultaneous transmit and receive (STAR). As this area matures, research is shifting towards reducing device form factors and creating novel self-interference cancellation techniques along with completely-integrated IBFD transceivers. In this workshop, experts from industry, academic and federal research institutions will discuss the various approaches that can be taken to construct IBFD systems and devices in an integrated fashion. Additionally, a mini-panel session is planned where the workshop speakers will debate the answers to questions posed by attendees for an interactive discussion with the audience.

Microwave techniques are central to many modern quantum computing and quantum sensing platforms, ranging from those implemented with superconducting circuits to those relying on trapped ions. For instance, in superconducting technologies, qubits are implemented using nonlinear microwave resonators — which sometimes are frequency tunable — and coupling between qubits is often mediated using tunable LC filter networks. The state of a superconducting quantum processor is controlled using microwave signaling and measured using microwave reflectometry. Similarly, spin-qubit and trapped-ion systems often rely heavily on microwave signaling for their operation. As the culmination of decades of research, quantum computers can now perform certain classes of computations that are impractical using classical supercomputers. While today’s quantum computers have largely been enabled by advances in commercial microwave technology, the quest to build these machines has also led to pioneering research that has pushed the limits of microwave amplification, packaging, filtering, and system design. In this workshop, leading researchers will describe progress in microwave technologies as applied to quantum computing and quantum sensing. The workshop is both broad and deep, covering microwave technologies that are used across the quantum computing landscape. At the high level, researchers will describe how microwave techniques are used to control superconducting, spin, and trapped-ion based quantum processors, covering a wide array of topics ranging from how microwave fields can be used in the trapping and manipulation of single ions to modular and SoC-based control systems for next-generation superconducting and spin qubit based quantum computers. The workshop will also contain deep dives into areas such as the systematic design of near-quantum-limited microwave parametric amplifiers, superconducting interconnect and filtering networks, system level quantum-coherent microwave packaging techniques, the cryogenic noise limits of semiconductor amplifiers, and quantum sensor systems leveraging microwave techniques. Central to all talks is the connection between microwave technology and the quantum information sciences.

Power amplifiers for high frequency applications can benefit greatly from the ability to dynamically vary the supply voltage. For example, when spectral efficient signals are used, their large amplitude dynamic generally requires a compromise between linearity and efficiency of the amplifier, leading to poor average efficiency. By applying supply modulation in the form of envelope tracking, the average efficiency can be enhanced significantly. The introduction of GaN technology has enabled highly efficient very fast switch-based supply modulators that are required for the very large instantaneous bandwidth in telecommunication for space and the future 5G systems. With the introductions of 5G the system frequency increase and power per PA is reduced by distributed PA solutions like MIMO. The same is true for space applications but here, the main motivation for the development of efficient solid-state solutions is the transfer from bulky tube based solutions. The large instantaneous bandwidth of the future telecom systems poses a challenge for dynamic supply modulation but the high frequency and reduced power allows for novel integrated solutions with reduced parasitic effects where the modulator and RFPA are integrated on the same chip. This workshop will: introduce the motivations and applications of supply modulation technologies for space and terrestrial telecommunication; discuss how RF transistor technologies affect the requirements of the supply modulator and the effectiveness of supply modulation; show advanced design techniques for the supply modulator and the integration with RF amplifier; present system level solutions including linearization of supply modulation-based amplifier systems. Moreover, two expert talks on supply modulation for dynamic power control in high power ISM systems is also considered and optimized, compact envelope tracking for 3D printers will enable cross-fertilization with fields adjacent to the microwave industry and permit a fruitful exchange of ideas.    

The organizer’s aim is to actively involve the audience in the discussion, in order to provide them with a useful experience. For this reason, an online quiz will involve the audience with questions that can be answered only by interacting with the speakers.

Recent advances of the GaN/GaAs technology development have enabled RF module switching at extremely high frequency that Si devices cannot withstand. It has shaped the landscape of RF industry and enabled applications in mm-wave frequency bands. In this full-day workshop, 9 talks will be presented from highly-recognized industrial leaders and technical experts across the globe. It covers the the major breakthrough from the latest development of GaN/GaAs technology and integration, including 1) heterogeneous integration of GaN/GaAs MMIC, 2) exploratory RF devices for mm-wave, and 3) systems and use-cases of GaN/GaAs technologies. At the closing of the day, an interactive panel session will be conducted between speakers and audiences. It is expected that the workshop can provide a platform for the latest mm-wave technology breakthroughs and a forum to share views.

Accurate on-wafer S-parameter measurement plays an important role in the development of mm-wave integrated circuits for communications and electronics applications. To this end, a group of international experts in this field will share their experience on making reliable on-wafer measurements at high frequencies (eg above 100GHz). The presenters come from different backgrounds — instrumentation manufacturers, metrology institutes, end-users in industry and academia — and so provide different perspectives on this topic. The emphasis of the workshop is on sharing practical tips (ie good practice) so that attendees can subsequently implement such methods in their own workplaces. The workshop will cover topics including calibration techniques, verification methods, guides on design of custom calibration standards, instrumentation, and applications, etc. The workshop includes two panel discussions: (i) an open discussion about the challenges/opportunities/outlooks for research into on-wafer measurements in coming years; and (ii) an opportunity for attendees to describe their own on-wafer measurement problems so that these can be discussed, and hopefully solved, during the workshop.

Gallium nitride (GaN) high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) are an excellent technology for various microwave power amplifier applications due to the underlying semiconductor’s wide bandgap, high breakdown voltage and large peak electron velocity. A key bottleneck to the technology’s widespread and long-term adoption into commercial and military applications is its inherent electrical reliability. The physical mechanisms of GaN HEMT electrical degradation are largely unresolved and actively under investigation. In this full-day workshop, international experts in the fields of microwave measurements, trap characterization, thermal characterization, GaN HEMT nonlinear modeling, trap modeling, and TCAD modeling will present state-of-the-art research. 

This interactive workshop aims to inform and excite the attendees on the advances in multiple aspects of this technology. Starting with a GaN technology overview, the planned talks will inform the audience into measurement and characterization of this technology including the charge trapping and thermal properties in these devices. Next part of the workshop covers the modeling and simulation research in GaN. Starting with an overview of modeling challenges in GaN devices, the workshop will cover the latest industry standard compact models and advances in TCAD-based modeling of GaN devices. 

The focus of the workshop is to provide an overview on transistor performance limits in terms of reliably achievable RF output power of various semiconductor technologies that are presently competing for mobile radio-frequency (RF) applications such as 5G, 6G, automotive radar and imaging, operating in the mm-wave frequency range (ie 30GHz to 300GHz). Of particular interest here are power amplifiers, oscillators, Mach-Zehnder-interferometers, and all sorts of RF buffer circuits that drive transistors to their dynamic large-signal limits and are implemented in semiconductor technologies such as III-V HBTs, SiGe HBTs and FDSOI-CMOS. The presentations will explore the presently quite heterogeneous approaches for determining the transistor related safe-operating-area in terms of reliability and ruggedness for designing circuits that are supposed to deliver high output power at high frequencies in mobile applications. The workshop starts with a tutorial on the design specifications of the above mentioned circuits and the corresponding requirements for large-signal dynamic transistor operation up to the mm-wave region. Based on this motivation, several presentations will outline, for each of the technologies, the state-of-the-art of transistor characterization for RF ruggedness as well as the device physics that cause degradation and the modeling approaches for including reliability aspects in process design kits. The workshop concludes with a tutorial on existing measurements methods for large-signal device testing in the mm-wave range.

Digital signal processing (DSP) is the critical element to adapt dynamic wireless propagation media and mitigate nature and man-made impairments. Today’s model-based DSP techniques function well in the stationary wireless channel, which can be easily disrupted by the random events such as in-band interference, noise and non-stationary fading channels. Emerging AI/ML techniques have demonstrated unique capability to capture and mitigate these corner cases. These AI/machine learning techniques can significantly enhance the processing capability better than the legacy model-banded DSP techniques. This workshop will illustrate several recent advances in AI-ML-based signal processing techniques to mitigate impairments, such as non-stationary channel fading, interference, and noise, in wireless channels to enable robust wireless communication and radar applications.

In the past 10 years, there has been a great push in the development of a fundamentally new International System of Units (SI) traceable approach to electric field sensing. Atom-based measurements allow for this direct SI-traceability, and as a result, usage of Rydberg atoms (traceable through Planck’s constant) have greatly matured via measurement techniques and sensor head developments. Current Rydberg atom sensors have the capability of measuring amplitude, polarization, and phase of RF fields. Promising benefits of this quantum technology for RF receivers are the extremely large tuning range from DC fields to the submillimeter range, high selectivity in the instantaneous RF bandwidth from the nature of atomic transitions at each frequency choice, and the frequency-independent size of the sensor head. Applications of these sensors include SI-traceable E-field probes, voltage standards, power sensors, microwave radiometers, direction of arrival estimation, radar and communication receivers with amplitude, frequency, and phase modulated signal discrimination, and many others. This workshop will give an overview and summarize this new technology, discuss various applications, and pathways to commercialization.