Q&A: Charles Trantanella, Chief Scientist at Custom MMIC (.PDF Download)

CD: You gave a presentation at EDI CON 2016 titled, “Reaching New Heights in Mixer Linearity with GaN MMIC Technology.” For those who may not have seen it, what prompted you to investigate developing mixers based on GaN technology?

CT: Essentially, it was engineering curiosity! I have been designing passive MMIC mixers for nearly 20 years, and during that time I’ve always jumped at the chance to create mixers on new technologies. The impetus for this curiosity began in the early 2000s when the GaAs industry pivoted towards pHEMT technology, which was touted as being vastly superior to the current MESFET technology in all regards. And in many circuits, such as amplifiers and switches, pHEMT certainly was better. But surprisingly enough, for passive mixers, I found that pHEMT was inferior to MESFET from a linearity perspective.