Towards Low Power Consumption MMIC UWB Localization System

Many UWB precise localization systems have been successfully demonstrated. Most of these developed systems are based on assembly of off-the-shelf hybrid components and consume significant DC power. But, recently many MMIC circuits with extremely low power consumption have been successfully developed and present a new opportunity for evolving low cost, compact, and significantly reduced power consumption systems opening the door for new set of UWB applications. Here, we present our efforts to replace some of previously used hybrid components by MMIC chips developed by Ulm University as a first step towards developing a fully MMIC chip for UWB precise localization system. UWB localization system with discrete and partially MMIC versions demonstrated similar performance, but the one with MMICs has significantly reduced power consumption and footprint.