Power gain
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The power gain of an electrical network is the ratio of an output power to an input power. Unlike other signal gains, such as voltage and current gain, "power gain" may be ambiguous as the meaning of terms "input power" and "output power" is not always clear. Three important power gains are average power gain, transducer power gain and available power gain.
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[edit] Average power gain
The average power gain of a two-port network, GP, is defined as:
where
- Pload is the average power delivered to the load
- Pinput is the average power entering the network
In terms of y-parameters this definition can be used to derive:
where
- YL is the load admittance
- YS is the source admittance
This result can be generalized to z, h, g and y-parameters as:
where
- kxx is a z, h, g or y-parameter
- ML is the load value in the corresponding parameter set
- MS is the source value in the corresponding parameter set
[edit] Transducer power gain
The transducer power gain of a two-port network, GT, is defined as:

where
- Pload is the average power delivered to the load
- Psource,max is the maximum available average power at the source
Psource,max may only be obtained from the source when the load impedance connected to it (i.e. the equivalent input impedance of the two-port network) is the complex conjugate of the source impedance, a consequence of the maximum power theorem.
[edit] Available power gain
The available power gain of a two-port network, GA, is defined as:

where
- Pload,max is the maximum available average power at the load
- Psource,max is the maximum available average power at the source
Similarly Pload,max may only obtained when the load impedance is the complex conjugate of the output impedance of the network.




