A comparison among different setups for measuring on-wafer integrated inductors in RF applications

This paper presents a comparison to study the most suitable setup for measuring an integrated inductor using a vector network analyzer. It assumes that the inductor will be modeled with the /spl Pi/ model, the lumped equivalent circuit most often used by designers. We have demonstrated that measuring an inductor with a one-port analyzer is not suitable for an accurate characterization of this type of device. Instead, we propose that the best method is measuring the inductor placed in series between the two ports of the analyzer. The method presented can be extrapolated to the study of how to measure other two-port devices in which the lumped equivalent circuit used to characterize its performance is previously known.