low-noise amplifier

low-noise amplifierChapter 7
Low-Noise Amplifiers
The history of high-frequency receivers is largely the history of the search for low noise. One of the most important goals―and successes―of the MIT Radiation Laboratory, during the 1940s, was the improvement of the sensitivity of radar receivers. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, as space communication matured, the search for low-noise diode mixers became critical. The development of low-noise microwave FET devices, and their improvement to the point of astonishingly low noise figures, was one of the major technological successes of the 1980s and 1990s. Even though we now have extraordinarily good low-noise transistors, the problem of optimization is just as important as in the past. Indeed, there is no point in incurring the huge expense and effort of develop