Unilateral gain of heterojunction bipolar transistors at microwave frequencies

General expressions for the h parameters of small-signal equivalent circuit models for emitter-up and emitter-down heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBTs) are derived. The unilateral gain U is calculated from these h parameters for InGaAs/InAlAs n-p-n HBTs. When the device parasitics are sufficiently reduced, the unilateral gain is found to exhibit a resonance behavior at high frequencies that deviates from the traditionally assumed 6-dB/octave roll-off. This unusual behavior in the unilateral gain is found to be caused by the appearance of negative output conductance of the device in certain bands of frequencies. The occurrence of the negative output conductance is shown to be a transit-time effect, and its implication for the device performance at high frequencies is discussed.>