Abstract: A 3–5 GHz low power BPSK modulated impulse radio UWB transmitter is implemented in 0.13 μm CMOS technology. In this design the amplitude and spectrum of the output impulse are both tunable to solve the special problem in IR-UWB, where it is difficult to control the spectrum. Measurement results indicate that, by changing the control bits in the gain control circuit and differential circuit, the 3-step peak-to-peak voltage amplitudes are 240, 170 and 115 mV and the center frequency of the impulse can be tuned from 3.2 to 4.1 GHz. A power controlled output buffer is designed to drive the antenna. The total power consumption is only 4.44 mW when transmitting a baseband signal of 100 MHz. The chip area is 1.2×1.4 mm2.

Key words: IR-UWB,  pulse generator,  BPSK