| Title |
A 30V APT Buck Converter to Improve Efficiency of GaN Power Amplifiers in Base-station Applications |
| Authors |
윤성준(Seong-Jun Youn) ; 김정훈(Jeonghun Kim) ; 김민주(Min-Ju Kim) ; 최규진(Gyujin Choi) ; 박수진(Soo-Jin Park) ; 박소민(So-Min Park) ; 위성욱(Sung-Uk We) ; 백지선(Ji-Seon Paek) |
| DOI |
https://doi.org/10.5573/ieie.2026.63.4.38 |
| Keywords |
High voltage; APT; Buck converter; Bootstrap; RF GaN PA; Power efficiency |
| Abstract |
In this paper, a 30V APT (Average Power Tracking) Buck Converter is designed using a 130-nm BCD process to supply power to a GaN power amplifier (PA) for base-station applications. The proposed circuit employs a bootstrap gate driver to reliably drive the high-side NMOS switch. The converter is implemented with a half-bridge structure based on a cross-coupled bootstrap cell, providing stable switching operation and a wide output voltage control range even under high-voltage conditions. The designed buck converter achieves a maximum power conversion efficiency of 95.5%. The efficiency of GaN PA with 30V APT buck converter is improved by 9.5% at 36dBm output power under 9dB back-off operation. |