A compact Class D RF power amplifier

for mobile nuclear magnetic resonance

systems
Cite as: Rev. Sci. Instrum. 88, 074704 (2017); https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4994734
Submitted: 30 January 2017 . Accepted: 06 July 2017 . Published Online: 25 July 2017

J. Zhen , R. Dykstra , C. Eccles, G. Gouws, and S. Obruchkov

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© 2017 Author(s).
 REVIEW OF SCIENTIFIC INSTRUMENTS 88, 074704 (2017)

A compact Class D RF power amplifier for mobile nuclear magnetic

resonance systems
J. Zhen,1 R. Dykstra,2 C. Eccles,3 G. Gouws,2 and S. Obruchkov2
1 Centrefor Energy, The University of Western Australia, Perth 6009, Australia
2 Schoolof Engineering and Computer Science, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington 6012, New Zealand
3 Magritek Ltd., Wellington 6037, New Zealand

(Received 30 January 2017; accepted 6 July 2017; published online 25 July 2017)
A 20 MHz Class D amplifier with an output of 100 W of RF power has been developed. The compact
size printed circuit board area of 50 cm2 and efficiency of 73% make it suitable for mobile nuclear
magnetic resonance (NMR) systems. Test results show that the rise and ring down times of the ampli-
fier are less than 0.2 µs, and it is capable of producing constant amplitude pulses as short as 2 µs.
Experiments using a Carr Purcell Meiboom Gill pulse sequence with a NMR MOUSE sensor confirm
that the Class D amplifier is suitable for mobile NMR applications. Published by AIP Publishing.
[http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4994734]

I. INTRODUCTION filter and converts the rectangular voltage pulses to a smooth

The physical size of mobile Nuclear Magnetic Resonance
(NMR) systems is often dominated by the power amplifier
required to excite the NMR probe, usually Class A or AB. Also,
the efficiency of these linear amplifiers is under 50% in prac-
tice.1,2 These factors therefore limit the application of mobile
NMR systems. Class D amplifiers have been used in audio and
low frequency NMR applications and easily achieve efficien-
cies as high as 90%.3,4 The challenge is to design such high
efficiency amplifiers to operate in the tens of MHz frequency
range with output powers of 100 W and above. The operating
frequency of Class D amplifiers is limited by the switching
capability of MOSFET devices, which require a finite time to
turn on and off, as well the capability of the driver circuit to
rapidly charge and discharge the MOSFET gate capacitance.
With the advances in MOSFET technology, high power and
high frequency switching MOSFETs are now available on the
market.5,6 Using carefully designed driver methods, it is pos-
sible to produce Class D amplifiers for NMR applications in
the tens of MHz frequency range. A Class D amplifier oper-
ating with 6 W output power at 4 MHz has previously been
demonstrated.7 The work here will present an amplifier design
with an output power of 100 W, operating at 20 MHz which
is suitable to work with a Mobile Universal Surface Explorer
(MOUSE) NMR sensor.8 The performance of the amplifier
is also compared with a commercially available Class A
amplifier.14
II. DESIGN AND PERFORMANCE
A. Voltage switching Class D amplifiers
A simplified Class D circuit with a tuned network out-
put is shown in Fig. 1. There are two transistors or MOSFET
switches: the one on the top, Q1, is usually referred to as the
“high side,” and the other, Q2, is referred to as the “low side.”
The output from the two switches drives a tank network with
the load as part of this network. This tank network acts as a
sine wave output.
Figure 1 shows a voltage switching amplifier where the
tuned circuit LCR elements are in series. In the case of a cur-
rent switching amplifier, the LCR elements are connected in
parallel. The operation of both voltage switching and current
switching Class D circuits is the same, the difference being
the current source supply and the type of tuned circuit on the
output.1,2 In practice, the voltage switching type is preferred
due to the lower current rating requirements of the MOSFETs,
as high voltage MOSFETs are readily available on the market.
There is also a report 9 that the voltage switching type has a
slightly higher efficiency at high power when operating at high
frequencies. Thus the voltage switching amplifier has been the
focus of this research.
B. Power switching devices and gate driver circuit
The main advantage of a Class D amplifier is power effi-
ciency. Because the switching transistors (usually MOSFETs)
are operated in either conductive or non conductive states
only, power dissipation is low as MOSFETs have very low
on-resistances, RDS(ON) . Class D amplifiers can thus achieve
efficiencies of 80% or higher. Recently, power devices have
become available with fast switching times and low gate capac-
itance. For example, CSD17313Q2 from Texas Instruments10
has gate capacitance Cg = 0.45 nF, turn-on rise time tr = 2.8 ns,
turn-off fall time tf = 1.3 ns, maximum drain/source voltage
rating VDS = 30 V, maximum continuous drain current rating
ID = 19 A, drain/source on resistance RDS(ON) = 24 mΩ, and
typical maximum power dissipation of 2.4 W when mounted
on a printed circuit board (PCB).
The gate driver is also an important part of the Class D
circuit, as the MOSFETs must be turned on and off quickly
to ensure low switching losses. For that the driver needs to
charge and discharge the gate and parasitic capacitors of the
MOSFET within the switching times of the devices. For a gate
drive voltage of 5 V to switch within 1.3 ns, the required current
is

0034-6748/2017/88(7)/074704/6/$30.00 88, 074704-1 Published by AIP Publishing.

074704-2 Zhen et al. Rev. Sci. Instrum. 88, 074704 (2017)

FIG. 1. Simplified Class D circuit. Note that the wave-

forms are for illustrative purposes only and do not
represent the true shape or timing.

FIG. 2. Gate driver and MOSFET circuit that can pro-

duce a 20 MHz square wave output.

dV   5 see Fig. 3. The dead-time has a direct impact on the efficiency

i=C = 0.45 × 10−9 × = 1.73 A.
dt 1.3 × 10−9 of the amplifier, and it is adjusted to be as short as possible
A gate driver circuit, shown in Fig. 2, uses ISL55110 devices while avoiding shoot-through.12
from Intersil11 to drive a set of MOSFETs in a Class D Figure 4 shows the gate driver inputs and outputs while
arrangement with a target operating frequency of 20 MHz. The driving a complementary pair of MOSFETs with a dead-time
ISL55110 device can provide current pulses of up to 3.5 A and
itself has rise and fall times of 1.5 ns. Note that a floating power
supply is required for the top gate driver (U22) as the common
is connected to the output.
It is very important to ensure that the two MOSFETs are
“on” only one at a time. If both of them are “on” at the same
time, the power supply will be shorted to ground through
the MOSFETs (i.e., a shoot-through), resulting in high cur-
rent flowing through the devices. To avoid this and protect
the devices from damage, a small delay is used between the
switching “off” time of Q1 and the switching “on” time of Q2.
This ensures that Q1 is “off” before Q2 is turned “on” and
vice versa. This delay time is referred to as the “dead-time,”

FIG. 4. Gate driver inputs and outputs at an operating frequency of 20 MHz.

FIG. 3. Conduction angles of the power devices in the Class D circuit.
The blue and orange signals are gate input logic signals with 10 ns dead-
time setting, while green and purple are corresponding driver outputs on the
MOSFET gates. The gate driver output signals are not square shaped due to
the effect of the MOSFET gate capacitance. The peak voltage output of the
driver is 10 V, and the full scale time of the plot is 100 ns.
074704-3 Zhen et al.
setting of 10 ns. The driver outputs correspond to the logic
inputs but with typically a 7 ns propagation delay. The output
of the driver, at turn off, returning to ground level indicates the
gate capacitance of the MOSFET being fully discharged and
hence in the off state. The adequate timing margin between
the MOSFETs switching indicates that the circuit is capable
of operating at 20 MHz.
C. Full bridge voltage switching Class D amplifier
The output power requirement of 100 W is considered to
be high for a Class D amplifier working at 20 MHz, therefore
a full bridge (known as an H bridge) configuration was used.
The full bridge configuration allows for better control of the
amplifier during the end of a transmit stage, as the two bottom
MOSFETs can be used to ground the output nodes to prevent
any oscillations. This is very important for NMR systems as
it affects the rise time and ring down of the RF pulses being
generated. A resonant tank was used to convert high power
pulses into sinusoidal waveforms, and a transformer (BN-61-
002 material) was used at the output for impedance matching
to a 50 Ω load. A schematic diagram of the amplifier out-
put stage is shown in Fig. 5. The circuit is similar to a full
bridge resonant LC power converter, the difference being that
it does not have the rectifier diodes on the output. Switches S1
and S4 are controlled to give the positive output cycles, while
S2 and S3 are used to produce the negative cycle. The reso-
nant tank formed by the LC network was tuned to resonate at
20 MHz.
To achieve high output power from a Class D configura-
tion with a relatively low supply voltage, the load to be driven
has to be of low impedance on the order of few ohms. The
NMR MOUSE sensor impedance is typically 50 Ω, there-
fore the transformer at the output was chosen to have a 1:4
turns ratio, thus giving a reflected impedance of 3.125 Ω
on the primary side. The RF amplifier was designed to be
Rev. Sci. Instrum. 88, 074704 (2017)
FIG. 6. LT Spice simulation output at 20 MHz. Vp-p = 56 V, power = 125 W
RMS into the 3.125 Ω transformer primary.
controlled by a KEA 2 spectrometer (Magritek Ltd.,
Wellington, New Zealand) which uses a 24 V DC supply.
The power capability of the Class D circuit and component
values was found and simulated using LT Spice.13 The induc-
tance of the LC tank circuit is the leakage inductance of the
transformer and was measured to be 40 nH. The capacitance
value was adjusted to be approximately 1.68 nF. The output
waveform from the simulation is shown in Fig. 6. The out-
put voltage across the transformer primary has a peak to peak
value of 56 V, corresponding to 125 W RMS power into the
3.125 Ω load. It is the power on the primary side of the trans-
former, but there will be power losses in the transformer and
the actual power capability would be lower. Even with the
losses, it is expected that at least 100 W will be delivered
to the secondary side of the transformer to drive the 50 Ω
load.
A prototype of the design was built on a 4-layer 50 cm2
PCB with the finished amplifier weighing just under 120 g.
An existing commercially available 100 W Class A amplifier
that is considered somewhat portable and suitable for working
with the NMR MOUSE sensor has a PCB area of 160 cm2 and
FIG. 5. Schematic of a full bridge Class D RF amplifier
output stage.
074704-4 Zhen et al.
FIG. 7. Existing Class A amplifier (a) with large heat-sink and the new Class
D amplifier (b). The Class A amplifier has a PCB area of 120 cm2 and weighs
480 g; the Class D amplifier has a PCB area of 50 cm2 and weighs 120 g.
weighs 480 g.14 A photo comparison of the two amplifiers is
shown in Fig. 7. One big difference between the amplifiers is
the heat-sink (bottom side of PCB) on the Class A amplifier.
FIG. 8. 100 W pulses from Class A amplifier (a) and Class D amplifier (b)
into a 50 Ω load. The same input waveform was used in both cases.
Rev. Sci. Instrum. 88, 074704 (2017)
The use of such a heat-sink is essential in this case due to the
inefficiency of the Class A amplifier.
D. Performance
The performance of our Class D amplifier was compared
to the existing Class A amplifier. Typical pulse lengths used
with the NMR MOUSE are between 2 µs and 10 µs.8 Figure 8
shows the two amplifiers outputting a short 100 W pulse into
a 50 Ω load. It can be seen that the Class A amplifier takes
about 1 µs to settle, whereas the Class D amplifier reaches the
maximum amplitude after the second cycle and stays constant
for the pulse length. Normally amplifiers with a resonant tank
output have the problem of long rise and ring-down times; this
problem was overcome by using a lower Q tank circuit and the
intelligent switching of the MOSFETs where at the end of the
pulse, the low side MOSFETs are turned on to reduce the ring
down time.
One of the NMR pulse sequences used with the NMR
MOUSE is the spin echo sequence15 and consists of two RF
pulses with the first pulse, a 90° pulse, being half the energy
of the later second pulse known as the 180° pulse. The 180°
pulse is either double the amplitude or double the length of
the 90° pulse. With classic (Class A) amplifier systems, the
FIG. 9. Spin echo sequence RF pulses from Class A amplifier (a) and Class
D amplifier (b) into a 50 Ω load. Note in this case, the Class D amplifier output
power level is fixed so pulse modulation is performed by altering the pulse
length. The Class D trace also shows the amplifier gating control signal that
is typically applied to NMR pulse amplifiers.
074704-5 Zhen et al. Rev. Sci. Instrum. 88, 074704 (2017)

double amplitude method is used as it provides constant excita- TABLE I. Class A and D amplifier parameters including power and efficiency
tion bandwidth; however, for the Class D amplifier, the double measurements.
pulse length method is easier and is therefore used. Amplitude Parameter Magritek Class A Home built Class D
modulation using a Class D amplifier could be provided by
either modulating the conduction time of the transistors or by Rated DC supply voltage (V) 24 24
changing the bridge voltage and this will be the focus of some Maximum output power (W) 100 100
future work. Input impedance (Ω) 50 50
A spin echo pulse output from the two amplifiers is shown Output impedance (Ω) 50 50
in Fig. 9. It is interesting to note that the Class A amplifier is Input drive level (mW) <=1 1
still settling before the end of the pulse, whereas the Class D Bandwidth (MHz) 1-50 16-18
amplifier pulses show rapid rise time and very constant ampli- Module size (PCB area) (cm2 ) 160 50
tude even when doubling the pulse length. The Transistor Module weight (g) 480 120
Transistor Logic (TTL) pulse on the same figure shows the Vin (V)a 23.3 23.3
turn on and off times of the RF pulse. Iin (A)b 2.08 0.6
Another useful NMR pulse sequence for the MOUSE is Vout,p-p (V)c 190 202
the Carr Purcell Meiboom Gill (CPMG) pulse sequence16,17 η (%)d 19 73
which generates multiple echoes by using more than one 180° a V is the actual DC supply voltage to the amplifier.
in
pulse. This experiment is typically used to measure the sample b I is the difference in input current between the amplifier in the idle state and running
in
relaxation time T 2 . The efficiency of the two amplifiers was state.
cV
compared using their average input and output power over a out,pk-pk is the peak to peak output voltage measured on the 50 Ω load.
d η is the power efficiency, calculated using peak output RMS power at the duty cycle of
long CPMG pulse sequence consisting of 128°, 180° pulses at 10% verses DC input power.
10% duty cycle. A current probe was used to measure the cur-
rent drawn from the power supply of the entire spectrometer
system while the amplifier was running. This was then com-
pared to the steady state current demand when the amplifier
was not operational, the difference being the power required
for the RF generation (Fig. 10). It should be noted that both
amplifiers were expected to have similar and small standby cur-
rents, therefore justifying a relative efficiency measurement as
a good indicator of amplifier absolute efficiency. The DC input
voltage was measured to be 23.3 V, and the same 50 Ω load
was used to test both amplifiers. The corresponding RF gen-
erating current component for the Class A amplifier is 2.08 A
and 0.6 A for Class D. The RF output voltage for the Class A is
190 Vp-p and 202 Vp-p for the Class D. Based on those values,
the efficiency of the Class A amplifier was calculated to be
19% and 73% for Class D. A summary of the measurement
parameters as well as other amplifier parameters is shown in
Table I.

III. NMR MEASUREMENTS

FIG. 10. Power and efficiency measurements for Class A amplifier (a) and
Class D amplifier (b) driving into a 50 Ω load and performing a CPMG pulse
sequence. The top traces in the figures (blue) are from a current probe set for an
output of 100 mV/A. Note that the step response shape of the current demand
is largely due to the properties of the power supplies and filter capacitors used
and is not an important characteristic of the amplifier.
The ultimate test of the amplifiers is the NMR experiments
themselves. The CPMG experiment is sensitive to phase insta-
bilities during the RF pulses as well as the pulse ring down, so
it is a good test to verify the suitability of the Class D ampli-
fier. Both amplifiers were used with the MOUSE sensor to
perform the same relaxation experiments on a small sample
of rubber. Figure 11 shows Class A and Class D spin echo
and CPMG experiment results. The spin echo results were
obtained from a phase-cycled data-averaged sequence of 16
scans. The two results being similar is an indication of the two
amplifiers behaving in a similar fashion over the duration of
the 16 scans. The CPMG results were also obtained from the
average of 16 phase cycled scans. This time the pulse sequence
is much longer, with 128 echoes forming in each sequence;
this is shown as the raw CPMG echo data in the figures. The
similar T 2 decay constant of approximately 5 ms and similar
074704-6 Zhen et al.
amplitudes suggest that the behavior of the Class D amplifier
is close to that of the Class A amplifier.
IV. CONCLUSION
The similarity of the NMR test results between the Class
A and Class D amplifiers suggests that the latter is capable
of producing the output power and pulse sequences necessary
for NMR experiments. The efficiency of 73% at the operating
frequency of 20 MHz with 100 W output power, combined
with the fast rise time and short turn off time, is a significant
improvement when compared with the existing Class A ampli-
fier used with the NMR MOUSE sensor. However, it should
be noted that the Class D amplifier described here is a tuned
amplifier and therefore does not have the benefit of the Class
A amplifier of wide bandwidth and the ability to operate at
multiple frequencies. Nevertheless, the compact size and light
weight make the Class D amplifier a key enabler for portable
NMR systems.
Some applications will require more than 100 W of
RF power and or greater than 20 MHz operating frequency.
There are several possible solutions to this need. First, new
power transistors with improved voltage and current handling
capability as well as reduced gate capacitance are continu-
ally entering the market so it is expected that higher output
powers and operating frequencies will be obtained in the
future by simply replacing the power devices and increas-
ing the supply voltage. Second, several of the described
100 W modules could have their output powers combined
through a power combiner such as a lumped element quar-
ter wave (Wilkinson) power combiner. Third, a new design
could be implemented where multiple driver stages drive
Rev. Sci. Instrum. 88, 074704 (2017)
FIG. 11. Spin echo results from the Class A amplifier (a)
and Class D amplifier (c). CPMG results from the Class
A amplifier (b) with T2 determined to be 5.5 ms and the
Class D amplifier (d) with T2 = 4.7 ms.
multiple primaries in a single transformer. This would allow
the doubling of the output power with no expected increase in
the circuit board area.
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