A new design approach of broadband RF power amplifier (PA) is introduced in this work with combination of large signal X-parameter and Real-Frequency Technique (RFT). A theoretical analysis of large signal X-parameter is revisited, and a simplification method is introduced to determine the optimum large signal impedances of a Gallium Nitride HEMT (GaN HEMT) device. With the optimum impedance extraction over the wide frequency range (0.3 to 2.0 GHz), a wideband matching network is constructed employing RFT and the final design is implemented with practical mixed-lumped elements. The prototype broadband RF PA demonstrates an output power of 40 dBm. The average drain efficiency of the PA is found to be more than 60%; while exhibiting acceptable flat gain performance (12±0.25 dB) over the frequency band of (0.3-2.0 GHz). The PA designed using the proposed approach yields in small form factor and relatively lower production cost over those of similar PAs designed with the classical methods. It is expected that the newly proposed design method will be utilized to construct power amplifiers for radio communications applications.

In this paper, the high-power high-efficiency asymmetric Doherty power amplifiers based on high-voltage GaN HEMT devices with internal input matching for base station applications are proposed and described. For a three-way 1:2 asymmetric Doherty structures, an exceptionally high output power of 1 kW with a peak efficiency of 83% and a linear flat power gain of about 15 dB was achieved in a frequency band of 2.11-2.17 GHz, whereas an output power of 59.5 dBm with a peak efficiency of 78% and linear power gain of 12 dB and an output power of 59.2 dBm with a peak efficiency of 65% and a linear power gain of 13 dB were obtained across 1.8-2.2 GHz. To provide a high-efficiency broadband operation, the concept of inverted Doherty structure is applied and described in detail. By using a high-power broadband inverted Doherty amplifier architecture with a 2×120-W GaN HEMT transistor, a saturated power of greater than 54 dBm, a linear power gain of greater than 13 dB and a drain efficiency of greater than 50% at 7-dB power backoff in a frequency bandwidth of 1.8-2.7 GHz were obtained.