The Doherty amplifier is a modified
class B radio frequency
Radio frequency (RF) is the oscillation rate of an alternating electric current or voltage or of a magnetic, electric or electromagnetic field or mechanical system in the frequency range from around to around . This is roughly between the upp ...
amplifier
An amplifier, electronic amplifier or (informally) amp is an electronic device that can increase the magnitude of a signal (a time-varying voltage or current). It may increase the power significantly, or its main effect may be to boost the v ...
invented by
William H. Doherty William H. Doherty (August 21, 1907 – February 15, 2000) was an American electrical engineer noted for his invention of the Doherty amplifier.
Doherty was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, received his B.S. degree in electrical communication ...
of
Bell Telephone Laboratories
Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984),
then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996)
and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007),
is an American industrial research and scientific development company owned by mul ...
Inc in 1936. Whereas conventional class B amplifiers can clip on high input-signal levels, the Doherty power amplifier can accommodate signals with high peak-to-average power ratios by using two amplifier circuits within the one overall amplifier to accommodate the different signal levels. In this way, the amplifier achieves a high level of linearity while retaining good power efficiency.
In Doherty's day, within the Western Electric product line, the eponymous electronic device was operated as a linear amplifier with a driver which was modulated. In the 50,000-watt implementation, the driver was a complete 5,000-watt transmitter which could, if necessary, be operated independently of the Doherty amplifier and the Doherty amplifier was used to raise the 5,000-watt level to the required 50,000-watt level.
The amplifier was usually configured as a grounded-cathode, carrier–peak amplifier using two
vacuum tube
A vacuum tube, electron tube, valve (British usage), or tube (North America), is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric voltage, potential difference has been applied.
The type kn ...
s in parallel connection, one as a class B carrier tube and the other as a class B peak tube (
power transistor
A power semiconductor device is a semiconductor device used as a switch or rectifier in power electronics (for example in a switch-mode power supply). Such a device is also called a power device or, when used in an integrated circuit, a power IC ...
s in modern implementations). The tubes' source (driver) and load (antenna) were split and combined through +90 and −90 degree phase shifting networks. Alternate configurations included a grounded-grid carrier tube and a grounded-cathode peak tube whereby the driver power was effectively passed-through the carrier tube and was added to the resulting output power, but this benefit was more appropriate for the earlier and less efficient triode implementations rather than the later and more efficient tetrode implementations.
Successor broadcast developments
As successor to
Western Electric
The Western Electric Company was an American electrical engineering and manufacturing company officially founded in 1869. A wholly owned subsidiary of American Telephone & Telegraph for most of its lifespan, it served as the primary equipment ma ...
Company Inc. for radio broadcast transmitters, the Doherty concept was considerably refined by
Continental Electronics
Continental Electronics is an American manufacturer of broadcast and military radio transmitters, based in Dallas, Texas. Although Continental today is best known for its FM, shortwave, and military VLF transmitters, Continental is most signific ...
Manufacturing Company of Dallas, Texas.
Early Continental Electronics designs, by James O. Weldon and others, retained most of the characteristics of Doherty's amplifier but added medium-level screen-grid modulation of the driver (317B, et al.).
A further refinement of Doherty's amplifier was the high-level screen-grid modulation scheme invented by Joseph B. Sainton (317C, et al.).
Sainton's 317C series consisted of a class C carrier tube in parallel connection with a class C peak tube. As in Doherty's amplifier, the tubes' source (driver) and load (antenna) were split and combined through +90 and −90 degree phase-shifting networks. The unmodulated radio frequency carrier was applied to the control grids of both tubes with the same control grid bias points. Carrier modulation was applied to the screen grids of both tubes, but the screen grid bias points of the carrier and peak tubes were different and were established such that the peak tube was cut off when modulation was absent, and the amplifier was producing rated unmodulated carrier power, and both tubes were conducting, and each tube was contributing twice the rated carrier power during 100% modulation as four times the rated carrier power was required to achieve 100% modulation. As both tubes were operated in class C, a significant improvement in efficiency was thereby achieved in the final stage.
In addition, as the tetrode carrier and peak tubes required very little drive power, a significant improvement in efficiency within the driver was achieved as well. The commercial version of the Sainton amplifier employed a cathode-follower modulator, not the push-pull modulator disclosed in the patent,
[The disclosed push-pull modulator consisted of a phase-splitter with unequal gains followed by a non-inverting cathode-follower modulator (gain less than unity) from the non-inverting side of the phase-splitter and an inverting modulator (gain significantly greater than unity) from the inverting side of the phase-splitter. Therefore, the disclosed push-pull modulator wasn't push-pull at all. The commercial version utilized a pair of tubes in parallel as a cathode-follower modulator with, consequently, no need to balance grossly different gains of the two modulator tubes. However, a scheme to finely balance the two modulator tubes, which had the same nominal gain, was incorporated just the same.] and the entire 50,000-watt transmitter was implemented using only nine total tubes of four tube types, all of these being general-purpose tubes, a remarkable achievement, given that the 317C's most significant competitor, RCA's BTA-50G, was implemented using thirty-two total tubes of nine tube types, nearly one-half of these being special-purpose, being employed only in the BTA-50G.
Nearly 300 CE 317C transmitters were installed in
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...
alone, easily outdistancing all competitors combined, until the development of successor high-power transistorized designs.
Doherty amplifiers are widely used in modern digital broadcast transmitters for television and radio. The digital modulation used has a high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR).
Non-broadcast developments
Modern communication systems have seen the sudden resurrection of Doherty amplifiers in
4G and pre-
5G massive Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (mMIMO) based base stations. The fact that modern communication systems use complex signal modulation schemes like
OFDM
In telecommunications, orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) is a type of digital transmission and a method of encoding digital data on multiple carrier frequencies. OFDM has developed into a popular scheme for wideband digital commun ...
(Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) with a high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR), the probability of amplifier operating at its peak power with its maximum efficiency is very low. The property to the Doherty amplifier exhibiting multiple efficiency peaks at various lower power levels makes it an attractive option to boost the average efficiency of modern-day transmitters. The Doherty amplifier can accomplish by using a technique called "Dynamic Load Modulation" wherein the load is seen by the main amplifier changes as a function of power level in order to boost the efficiency at lower power levels.
Footnotes
References
*
*
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Further reading
* − US Patent
*
*{{cite web , last1=Sneijers , first1=Walter , title=Doherty Architectures in UHF , url=https://www.ampleon.com/documents/white-paper/AMP-WP-2016-0826.pdf , website=
Ampleon Ampleon is a global semiconductor manufacturer headquartered in Nijmegen (Gelderland), Netherlands
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Electronic amplifiers
Valve amplifiers