Peregrine Semiconductor Corp., founder of RF SOI (silicon on insulator) and pioneer of advanced RF solutions, announces the UltraCMOS® PE97240, an integer-N phase-locked loop (PLL) that offers superior phase noise performance for signal precision and frequency stability. Designed for commercial space applications, the PE97240 is radiation tolerant to 100 krad (Si) total ionizing dose (TID) that allows the part to perform for 10 or more years in harsh space conditions. Built on Peregrine’s UltraCMOS technology on a sapphire substrate, the PLL is naturally radiation hardened and immune to single-event latch-up (SEL).

“Peregrine has a proud heritage of over 15 years of space-flight PLL products,” says Kinana Hussain, senior marketing manager. “Our space customers trust the high reliability of UltraCMOS products, and PE97240 extends our successful PLL product family with improved phase-noise and superior rad-hard performance.”

Peregrine’s PE97240 Attains Industry-Leading Phase Noise Performance for Space Applications

Peregrine’s PLL has an integer-N frequency synthesizer that generates multiple output frequencies from a single reference input frequency. This divided down output enables reference and phase detection at lower frequency, and it handles both frequency and phase lock. With PLLs phase noise is an important measure of the signal’s spectral purity. Superior phase-noise performance significantly reduces phase jitter and noise, which offers RF engineers high signal precision and solid frequency stability. Phase noise is a product of thermal noise – expressed by the floor figure of merit (FOMfloor) – and low-frequency flicker noise – expressed by the flicker figure of merit (FOMflicker) – within the system. The PE97240 achieves an industry-leading maximum FOMfloor of -227 dBc/Hz with the 5/6 prescaler and -225 dBc/Hz with the 10/11 prescaler; the PLL also sets the bar with a FOMflicker of -265 dBc/Hz with the 5/6 prescaler and -259 dBc/Hz with the 10/11 prescaler.

Features, Packaging, Pricing and Availability

Peregrine’s UltraCMOS PE97240 is a rad-hard PLL designed for high-reliability space applications. It consists of a dual modulus prescaler, counters, a phase detector and control logic. The component can perform with high reliability due to its 100 krad (Si) TID radiation tolerance. The frequency range is 4 GHz in 5/6 prescaler modulus and 5 GHz in 10/11 prescaler modulus. The PLL has a low power consumption of 75 microamperes at 2.7 V, enabling RF engineers to better allocate power resources, and its counter values are programmable through a serial interface or by directly hard-wiring. In addition, the component is immune to single-event latch-up (SEL) due to heavy ions in radioactive environments. Offered in a RoHS compliant, 44-lead, hermetically sealed CQFP package, the PE97240 is available now.

A Murata company since December 2014, Peregrine holds more than 180 filed and pending patents and has shipped over 2 billion UltraCMOS units. For more information, visit http://www.psemi.com.