Complementary field-effect transistor mixer

Claim 2

An electronic mixer circuit as claimed in claim 1 wherein said signal subtraction means is a differential amplifier. 9

Claim 3

An electronic mixer circuit as claimed in claim 1 wherein said complementary field-effect transistors are junction field-effect transistors.

Claim 4

An electronic mixer circuit as claimed in claim 1 wherein said complementary field-effect transistors are insulated-gate field-effect transistors and wherein said complementary field-effect transistors are each biased to the midpoint of their characteristic such that each field-effect transistor acts as a linear amplifier thereby providing 180* oppositely varying signals from the two field-effect transistor drains as a result of a common simultaneously and identically applied signal input to the gates of the field-effect transistors.

Claim 5

An electronic mixer circuit as claimed in claim 5 wherein each field-effect transistor, although initially biased to act as a linear amplifier, is overdriven to saturation by a large gate signal such that a chopping action is obtained from the field-effect transistors for a signal commonly applied to the sources. A method of mixing first and second electrical signals comprising the steps of: a. applying the first electrical signal identically to each of the gate electrodes of a pair of complementary field-effect transistors, each of said transistors have a gate electrode, a drain electrode, and commonly connected source electrodes; b. applying the second electrical signal identically to the drain electrodes of the transistors; and c. subtracting the resulting electrical signal difference between the drain electrodes of the transistors to provide an electrical output signal comprised of a mixture of the first and second electrical signals.