The demand of small size electronic systems has been increasing for several decades. The physical size of systems is reduced due to advancements in integrated circuits. With reduction in size of electronic systems, there is also an increasing demand of small and low cost antennas. Patch antennas are one of the most attractive antennas for integrated RF front end systems due to their compatibility with microwave integrated circuits. To fulfil the demand of integrated RF front end systems, a design of microstrip patch antenna with optimum performance at 70GHz is investigated. The procedure could be extended to design other planar antennas that act in a similar way. In this work, three different design methods to design patch antennas for applications at 70GHz are investigated that include use of analytical models, numerical optimization, and numerical variation of dimensions. Analytical models provide a basic understanding of the operation of a patch antenna and they also provide approximate dimensions of a patch antenna for a targeted frequency without using numerical simulations. However, as the operating frequencies of RF systems reach mm-wave frequencies, we expect that the accuracy of analytical models become less accurate. For example, the excitation of substrate modes and effect of ground size are not predicted in simple analytical models. Due to these expected limitations of the analytical design methods, the accuracy of these models is investigated by numerical electromagnetic field simulations. In this work, CST Microwave Studio Transient Solver is used for that purpose. In order to make sure that the appropriate settings of the solver are applied, the simulation settings such as mesh density, boundary conditions and the port dimensions are investigated. The simulation settings may affect computation time and convergence of the results. Here, in this work, the accuracy of the simulator for a specific design of inset feed rectangular patch antenna is verified. The patch dimensions obtained from analytical calculations are optimized at 70GHz by using the optimizer of the transient solver. The patch dimensions obtained from optimizer are verified by varying the patch dimensions in equidistant steps around the found result of the optimizer. In a rectangular microstrip patch antenna design, the use of a width of 1.5 times the length is an approximate rule of thumb [1] for low dielectric constant substrates. It is also investigated how the performance properties of a microstrip patch antenna are affected by varying the width to length ratio of the patch. There are occasions where a different ratio is required because of space limitations, or to change the input impedance. The patch designs having various width to length ratios were optimized with the feed location. The analytically calculated dimensions provided good initial values of the rectangular patch antenna for further optimization using more accurate techniques. The design have been optimized at 70GHz for the investigated mesh density, boundary conditions and the port dimensions. The numerical variation of dimensions is found to be most reliable among the investigated design methods but it is more complicated with many parameters.

Design considerations and experimental results of a dual-band circularly polarized stacked microstrip antenna for GPS operations at 1227 and 1575 MHz are presented. The antenna is achieved by stacking two corner-truncated square microstrip patches. The obtained circular polarization (CP) bandwidths, determined from 3-dB axial ratio, are about 15 MHz (about 1.2%) and 17 MHz (about 1.1%) at 1227 and 1575 MHz, respectively. Good CP radiation patterns and antenna gain have also been observed.

The switched-beam antenna is one type of the smart antennas, which consists of the antenna array and the beamforming network. The four-beam smart antenna generates four beams to cover a 120¢X area, which can be used to improve the carrier-to-interference ratio and the frequency reuse of a cellular system. Due to the attractive features of microstrip antennas such as low profile, easy fabrication, and low cost, we use microstrip antennas as array elements. In this thesis, we propose a novel four-beam beamforming network which consists of a 4¡Ñ4 Butler Matrix and four 180¢X power dividers. This network is able to provide low side-lobe level. A modified Butler Matrix not only simplifies the circuit of the 8¡Ñ8 Butler Matrix, but also meet the requirement of the original Butler Matrix. From the result of measurement, the side-lobe level of each beam of the modified Butler Matrix is less than ¡V10 dB. We also show that this method is applicable to any Butler matrix.

In recent years there has been a growing demand for reduced mass, small launch volume, and, at the same time, high-gain large-aperture antenna systems in modern space-borne applications. This dissertation introduces new techniques for dual-band reflectarray antennas to meet these requirements. A series of developments is presented to show the dual-band capability of the reflectarray. A novel microstrip ring structure has been developed to achieve circular polarization (CP). A C/Ka dual-band front-fed reflectarray antenna has been designed to demonstrate the dual-band circular polarized operation. The proposed ring structure provides many advantages of compact size, more freedom in the selection of element spacing, less blockage between circuit layers, and broader CP bandwidth as compared to the patches. An X/Ka dual-band offset-fed reflectarray is made of thin membranes, with their thickness equal to 0.0508 mm in both layers. Several degrading effects of thin substrates are discussed. To overcome these problems, a new configuration is developed by inserting empty spaces of the proper thickness below both the X and Ka band membranes. More than 50 % efficiencies are achieved at both frequency ranges, and the proposed scheme is expected to be a good candidate to meet the demand for future inflatable antenna systems. An X/Ka dual-band microstrip reflectarray with circular polarization has also been constructed using thin membranes and a Cassegrain offset-fed configuration. It is believed that this is the first Cassegrain reflectarray ever developed. This antenna has a 0.75-meter-diameter aperture and uses a metallic sub-reflector and angular-rotated annular ring elements. It achieved a measured 3 dB gain bandwidth of 700 MHz at Xband and 1.5 GHz at Ka-band, as well as a CP bandwidth (3 dB axial ratio) of more than 700 MHz at X-band and more than 2 GHz at Ka-band. The measured peak efficiencies are 49.8 % at X-band and 48. 2 % at Ka-band. In summary, this dissertation presents a series of new research developments to support the dual-band operation of the reflectarray antenna. The results of this work are currently being implemented onto a 3-meter reflectarray with inflatable structures at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and are planned for other applications such as an 8-meter inflatable reflectarray in the near future.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2003. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Available also from UMI Company.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2005. / "Submitted to Department of Electronic Engineering in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 144-153).

[pt] Neste trabalho, o problema de valor de contorno associado à estrutura de uma linha microstrip blindada é formulado em termos de uma representação rigorosa de modos híbridos, superposição de modos TE e TM. As equações resultantes são então transformadas, através da aplicação do método de Galerkin no domínio espectral, para obtenção da equação característica para as propriedades de dispersão de linhas microstrip blindadas. As principais vantagens deste método são sua simplicidade e convergência rápida. Foi elaborado um programa de computador para cálculo dos parâmetros, e foram realizadas comparações com resultados experimentais e com expressões empíricas apresentadas por outros autores. A influência da variação da altura da blindagem superior é também considerada. / [en] The boundary value problem associated with the shielded microstrip-line structure is formulated in terms of a rigorous hybrid-mode representation, superposition of the TE and TM fields. The resulting equations are subsequently transformed, via the application of Galerkin’s method in the spectral domain, to yield a characteristic equation for the dispersion properties of shielded microstrip lines. Among the advantages of the method are its simplicity and rapid convergence. A computer program for the parameters is presented, and numerical results are compared with some experimental results and with theoretical and empirical results presented by other authors. The behavior with the variation of the height of the top cover is also considered.

No description available.

Abstract In the first part of this study, determination of the dielectric properties of the low loss microwave ceramic material, barium nonatitanate (Ba2Ti9O20), around 1 GHz is discussed. The structures under test were coaxial resonators, the cores of which were made of barium nonatitanate and the metallization was realised by thick film silver. The measured value of the real part of the relative dielectric constant was εr = 37 and that of the loss tangent was tan σ = 0.00014. The change of the resonance frequency of the coaxial resonators with temperature, in the range -20 … +80 C, was 4 ppm/ C. In addition, realisation of compact interdigital and comb-line bandpass filters was demonstrated for the 900 MHz mobile phone band. Besides Ba2Ti9O20, Ba(Sm,Nd)2Ti5O14 ceramic material with a dielectric constant of εr = 78 was also employed in order to improve the miniaturisation. The volume of the smallest filter was 2 cm3 and the weight was 9 g. In the second part of this study, various measurement methods have been demonstrated to determine the real part of the relative permittivity of FR4 fibreglass circuit board. Test structures were straight asymmetric open-circuited strip lines. It was found that the real part of the relative permittivity decreased slightly with frequency. At 0.72 GHz and 4.5 GHz, εr values of 4.3 and 4.1, respectively, were measured. All the characterisation methods used gave consistent values for εr, and electromagnetic simulators were used to verify the results. In the third part of this study, the structures under test were microstrip or strip line transmission lines, the S parameters of which were measured by using on-wafer measurement techniques. It was found that the insertion loss of the 10 mm long etched Cu microstrip was slightly less than that of the Ag microstrips which were manufactured by etching and gravure offset printing techniques, respectively. The performance of the Ag microstrips was, however, similar. In addition, a theoretical basis was established for the determination of εr of the dielectric substrate and the attenuation coefficient of the transmission lines under test. The calculations were based on signal flow diagrams. The method was applied to determine the dielectric and loss properties of a commercial, Kyocera, Japan, LTCC (Low Temperature Cofired Ceramic) material up to 50 GHz. The measured value of the real part of the relative permittivity was εr = 5.7, and the loss tangent was approximately tan σ = 0.003. The essential idea behind the studies reported in this thesis was twofold. First, the studies aimed at characterising dielectric media which find usage in the realisation of UHF, microwave or millimetre wave circuits. Second, the studies aimed to obtain data of immediate value in practical design work. For this reason, the structures under test were transmission lines having extensive usage in practical high frequency circuit design.

Le travail de cette thèse concerne la conception de nouvelles architectures d'antennes miniatures ou multifréquences en utilisant la technique inspirée des métamatériaux. Les antennes proposées sont munies de nouvelles formes d'éléments parasites qui permettent d'obtenir des structures compactes et donc facilement intégrables dans les terminaux mobiles. Par la suite, l'étude et la conception d'antennes directives et reconfigurables en diagramme de rayonnement par la technique inspirée des métamatériaux a été menée. En première partie, une étude paramétrique sur les paramètres pertinents de la structure a été effectuée afin de bien comprendre le fonctionnement de celle-ci. En deuxième partie, des antennes miniatures et directives sont proposées. Finalement, de nouvelles structures directives et reconfigurables en diagramme de rayonnement sont présentées. / The work of this thesis concerns the design of new architectures of miniature antennas by using the concept of metamaterials-inspired.The proposed antennas integrate new shapes of parasitic elements that allow to obtain compact structures and therefore easily integrated into mobile devices.