Study of the background noise in microwave GaAsFET devices

One of the most important properties of the gallium arsenide field effect transistor is its low noise figure in the microwave frequency range (approx. 1 dB, 4 GHz). The applications of this device in components and systems in the high frequency range require analysis of background noise in terms of basic static and dynamic properties of the device. The purpose of this paper is to review GaAsFET noise properties; from this review, a description of precise noise measurement techniques is made. Some experimental and theoretical results on the minimum noise figure are shown for several GaAsFET devices. (author)