Using S-Parameters in MATLAB & Simulink

A sequence of examples is provided that demonstrate how S-parameter measurements can be made and utilized to design a radio Frequency amplifier. An HP (now Agilent) 8505A system controlled by MATLAB is used to characterize a bipolar transistor in terms of its S-parameters. These measurements are used to design input and output matching networks for a prescribed 20 dB gain. The resulting design is verified in MATLAB using the RF Toolbox. A Simulink model of the transistor with the LC matching circuits is created to show a way that S-parameter models can be incorporated in the Simulink environment. The RF Blockset provides a more efficient way to do this, but is limited to bandpass structures that can be modeled a baseband Complex subsystems.