Verification of the wafer-level LRM+ calibration technique for GaAs applications up to 110 GHz

In this article the accuracy of the LRM+ calibration is compared to that of the benchmark NIST multiline TRL procedure for the first time. The comparison is performed on NIST verified GaAs coplanar waveguide calibration reference material 8130. The NIST calibration comparison method is used to quantify the difference between measured S-parameters corrected by NIST multiline TRL and an advanced LRM+ calibration. The worst-case error bounds for LRM+ corrected S-parameter measurements are determined up to 110 GHz. It is demonstrated that the difference between benchmark multiline TRL and LRM+ is comparable with the measurement system drift. Verification results prove that LRM+ can be successfully used for accurate GaAs on-wafer calibration with customized standards. This overcomes some drawbacks of multiline TRL while providing the same calibration accuracy.