Gallium arsenide monolithically integrated nonlinear transmission line impedance transformer

A nonlinear impedance transformer, comprising:

• a substrate;
• and
• a nonlinear transmission line integrated on said substrate, comprising:
• a plurality of L-C sections, each section having an inductor and a device which exhibits a capacitance which varies with the voltage, said sections connected in series to form a synthetic transmission line;
• a plurality of electrically isolated regions in said substrate each of which contains at least one of said devices which exhibit capacitance which varies with voltage across said device, each said device coupled to at least one of said inductors so as to periodically lead said synthetic transmission line with capacitance with varies with applied voltage thereby rendering said synthetic transmission line nonlinear;
• and
• wherein the values of inductance and zero bias capacitance in each section are scaled to form an impedance transformer whereby the impedance of said first section matches the output impedance of a driver coupled to the input of said first section and which supplies at least one input signal transition edge, and the output impedance of the last section matches the input impedance of a lead which receives the output signal from said synthetic nonlinear transmission line and which is different than said output impedance of said driver.

A nonlinear impedance transformer, comprising:

• a substrate of material;
• a nonlinear transmission line formed on said substrate having an input and an output and comprising a plurality of L-C sections connected in series to form a transmission line, each said L-C section having at least one inductor and one capacitor associated therewith, said nonlinear transmission line including at least two conductors integrated on said substrate, and further comprising a plurality of electrically isolated islands of semiconductor material formed on said substrate, each said island of semiconductor material having integrated therein, as the capacitor of an L-C section, a nonlinear capacitor having a capacitance which varies with applied voltage and which is coupled between said at least two conductors, the values of said inductance and capacitance in each said L-C section being selected so as to cause compression of the edge transition time of a signal propagating down said transmission line while establishing the input impedance of said nonlinear transmission line so as to match the output impedance of the driver which supplies the signal edge, said L and C values also being selected so that the output impedance of said nonlinear transmission line matches the input impedance of any load attached to said nonlinear transmission line which is different from said output impedance of said driver.