Disclosed is an amplifier capable of minimizing shortcircuit current of an output stage of a buffer upon transition of an output voltage while having a high slew rate without increasing power consumption. The amplifier includes an input unit, a conversion unit, an amplification unit, a frequency compensation circuit, and a short-circuit current minimization circuit. Alternatively, the amplifier includes an input unit, a conversion unit, an amplification unit, a frequency compensation circuit, a short-circuit current minimization circuit, and a slew rate improvement circuit.

A differential pair gain stage is disclosed. In one embodiment, the gain stage includes a differential pair of depletion-mode transistors, including a first and a second n-type transistor. In certain embodiments of the invention, the depletion mode transistor may be GaN (gallium nitride) field effect transistors. The gain stage includes an active load including one or more depletion mode transistors electrically coupled to at least one of the drains of depletion mode transistors of the differential pair. The active load may include a source follower for maintaining the AC voltages at the drains of the differential pair at a constant value and may further include a casocde stage for setting a fixed drain source voltage across the output transistors to increase the output impedance and gain of the stage.

An amplifying circuit includes a reference voltage generating circuit, a common-mode voltage conversion circuit, a common-mode negative feedback circuit, and an amplifying sub-circuit. The reference voltage generating circuit generates a first reference voltage, a second reference voltage, and a reference common-mode voltage according to a post-stage common-mode voltage. The common-mode voltage conversion circuit converts the pre-stage output differential signal into a differential input signal according to the reference common-mode voltage. The common-mode negative feedback circuit generates a control voltage to quickly establish a common-mode negative feedback of the amplifying sub-circuit, wherein the first reference voltage and the second reference voltage are used to cancel a baseline signal of the pre-stage output differential signal. The amplifying circuit can eliminate the baseline signal, convert the common-mode voltage and quickly establish the common-mode negative feedback.

A peak detector for a power amplifier is provided that includes a threshold voltage detector configured to pulse a detection current in response to an amplified output signal from the amplifier exceeding a peak threshold. A plurality of such peak detectors may be integrated with a corresponding plurality of power amplifiers in a transmitter. Should any peak detector assert an alarm signal or more than a threshold number of alarm signals during a given period, a controller reduces a gain for the plurality of power amplifiers.