Microwave-induced thermoacoustic (TA) imaging, combining high microwave contrast with high ultrasonic resolution has the potential to revolutionize applications such as continuous healthcare monitoring, point-of-care imaging, and biometric authentication. However, the size, cost, and integration of a high-power microwave transmitter is a key bottleneck in making TA imaging truly portable, affordable, and ubiquitous. Toward that end, this work presents a compact 4.9-GHz pulsed power amplifier (PA) with a 4.87-mm2 active area implemented in a 55-nm BiCMOS technology, operating in a duty-cycled mode and achieving 37.3-dBm peak output power—the highest demonstrated peak power in PAs fabricated on a silicon substrate with deep submicron CMOS integration. We also reconstruct the first known high-fidelity TA images of tissue phantoms using an integrated silicon PA.

中文翻译：

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用于便携式热声成像的多瓦级 4.9GHz 硅功率放大器


微波诱导热声 (TA) 成像将高微波对比度与高超声分辨率相结合，有可能彻底改变连续医疗保健监测、护理点成像和生物识别身份验证等应用。然而，高功率微波发射器的尺寸、成本和集成度是使 TA 成像真正便携、经济实惠和无处不在的关键瓶颈。为此，这项工作提出了一种紧凑型 4.9 GHz 脉冲功率放大器 (PA)，其有效面积为 4.87 mm2，采用 55 nm BiCMOS 技术实现，在占空比模式下运行，并实现 37.3 dBm 峰值输出功率 —在采用深亚微米 CMOS 集成的硅衬底上制造的 PA 中，已展示出最高的峰值功率。我们还使用集成硅 PA 重建了第一个已知的组织模型的高保真 TA 图像。