TUNNELING DEVICES AS MICROWAVE MIXERS AND DETECTORS

Semiconductor tunnel devices can be used as mixers or detectors of mic rowaves and two examples are given in this paper. First, single-barrie r tunnel detector diodes are described and their performance is compar ed with conventional devices at frequencies up to 35 GHz. Second, the predicted and measured performance of resonant tunnelling diodes as mi xers at 94 GHz are discussed. Such mixer diodes can exhibit conversion gain but it is shown that their noise figures are, in general, worse than conventional devices. Some conclusions are drawn regarding the li kely applications of both kinds of device.