Subelement F: Receivers— Topic 42: RF Amplifiers
Question 3-42F6
Element 3 (GROL)In what stage of a VHF receiver would a low noise amplifier be most advantageous?
Explanation
A low noise amplifier (LNA) is most advantageous in the front-end RF stage of a receiver. This is because the overall noise performance of a receiver system is predominantly determined by the noise added in its initial stages. A weak signal coming from the antenna is easily corrupted by noise. By placing an LNA immediately after the antenna, the weak signal is amplified with minimal additional noise, significantly improving the signal-to-noise ratio before further processing.
Placing the LNA in the IF stage (A) would be too late, as noise introduced by earlier RF components would already be present and amplified. Similarly, the audio stage (C) only processes the demodulated signal, and cannot reduce noise introduced much earlier. The power supply (D) provides DC current and is not a signal processing stage.
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