This thesis details the design of a high-speed RF delay locked loop(DLL). A new proposed phase detector architecture, coined the mixing phase detector, allows for phase detection at high frequencies, resulting in multiphase generation at these higher frequencies with a DLL. The mixing phase detector modulates the high frequency signal to DC, allowing for elementary circuits to be used that do not need high frequency capabilities. The mixing phase detector has been designed, entirely laid out, and will be taped out shortly, with which simulations have been performed and have been compared with the state-of-the-art. The simulated results, show the possibility of generating eight phases accurately at 11.1 GHz, which would be higher than the state-of-the-art.

In this report the analysis of underwater communication using electric quasi-static fields is undertaken, in which key aspects that influence the performance the communication between a transmitting and receiving electrode is examined. A mathematical model was proposed for the transmission and reception of the quasistatic field and the expected amount of atmospheric noise at the receiving electrode. The quasi-static model of the electric field is verified using a measurement setup, which entailed the measuring of transmission and reception between electrodes and the impedances and noise of different types of electrodes. In small box of water (30L) it was shown that the quasi-static model matches the measurements and the size of electrodes influences the transmission and reception. In general, decreasing the resistance of the transmitting electrodes allows for the charge to be easily transferred from the electrode to the water increasing the amount of transferred power into the water and by reducing the impedance of the receiver reduces the noise measured at the input.