Yes / A novel 50μm Silicon-based on-chip antenna is presented that combines metamaterial (MTM) and substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) technologies for integration in THz circuits operating from 0.28 to 0.30 THz. The antenna structure comprises a square patch antenna implemented on a Silicon substrate with a ground-plane. Embedded diagonally in the patch are two T-shaped slots and the edges of the patch is short-circuited to the ground-plane with metal vias, which convert the structure into a substrate integrated waveguide. This structure reduces loss resulting from surface waves and Silicon dielectric substrate. The modes in the structure can be excited through two coaxial ports connected to the patch from the underside of the Silicon substrate. The proposed antenna structure is essentially transformed to exhibit metamaterial properties by realizing two T-shaped slots, which enlarges the effective aperture area of the miniature antenna and significantly enhances its impedance bandwidth and radiation characteristics between 0.28 THz to 0.3 THz. It has an average gain and efficiency of 4.5dBi and 65%, respectively. In addition, it is a self-isolated structure with high isolation of better than 30dB between the two ports. The on-chip antenna has dimensions of 800×800×60 μm3. / H2020-MSCA-ITN-2016 SECRET-722424 and the financial support from the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) under grant EP/E0/22936/1

Abstract The main objective of this thesis was to research the integration of novel materials and fabrication processes into Low Temperature Co-fired Ceramic (LTCC) technology; enabling fabrication of Radio Frequency (RF) and microwave components with advanced performance. The research focuses on two specific integration cases, which divide the thesis into two sections: the integration of tunable dielectric structures and the integration of air filled waveguides. The first section of the thesis describes the development and characterization of low sintering temperature Barium Strontium Titanate (BST) thick film paste. Sintering temperature of BST is decreased from approximately 1350 °C down to 900 °C by lithium doping and pre-reaction of the doped composition. This allows the co-sintering of the developed BST paste with commercial LTCC materials. Additionally two integration techniques to embed tunable components in an LTCC substrate using the developed BST paste are also presented and the electrical performance of the components is evaluated. The highest measured tunability value was 44% with a bias field of 5.7 V/µm. The permittivity of the films varied between 790 and 190, and the loss tangent varied between 0.004 and 0.005, all measured unbiased at 10 kHz. The developed LTCC compatible BST paste and the presented integration techniques for tunable components have not been previously published. In the second section of the thesis, a fabrication method for the LTCC integrated air-filled rectangular waveguides with solid metallic walls is presented. The fabrication method is described in detail and implemented in a set of waveguides used for characterization. A total loss of 0.1–0.2 dB/mm was measured over a frequency band of 140–200 GHz. The electrical performance of the waveguides is evaluated and their use demonstrated in an integrated LTCC antenna operating at 160 GHz.

This thesis presents the first fully tunable substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) filter implemented with PIN diodes and RF MEMS switches. The methodology for tuning SIW filters is explained in detail and is used to create three separate designs. Each SIW cavity is tuned by perturbing via posts connecting or disconnecting to/from the cavity's top metal layer. In order to separate the biasing network from the SIW filter, a three-layer PCB is fabricated using Rogers RT/duroid substrates. The first tunable design utilizes the Philips BAP55L PIN diode. This two-pole filter provides six frequency states ranging from 1.55 GHz to 2.0 GHz. Fractional bandwidth ranges from 2.3 percent – 3.0 percent with insertion loss and return loss better than 5.4 dB and 14 dB respectively for all frequency tuning states. The second tunable design utilizes the Radant RMSW-100 MEMS switch, providing six states ranging from 1.65 GHz to 2.1 GHz. Fractional bandwidth for this filter varies from 2.5 percent - 3.0 percent with insertion loss and return loss better than 12.4 dB and 16 dB respectively for all states. The third design utilizes the OMRON 2SMES-01 RF MEMS relay, providing fourteen states ranging from 1.19 GHz to 1.58 GHz. Fractional bandwidth ranges from 3.6 percent - 4.4 percent with insertion loss and return loss better than 4.1 dB and 15 dB respectively for all frequency states. Two of the three designs (Philips PIN diode and OMRON MEMS) produced good results validating the new SIW filter tuning methodology. Finally, to illustrate the advantage of microstrip planar structures integrated with SIW structures, low pass filters (LPFs) are implemented along the input and output microstrip-to-SIW transition regions of the tunable SIW filter. With minimal change to the overall filter size, this provides spurious suppression for the additional resonant modes inherently present in waveguide structures. The implemented design utilizes the same OMRON MEMS tunable SIW filter specifications. This two-pole tunable filter provides the same performance as the previous OMRON MEMS design with exception to an added 0.7 dB insertion loss and spurious suppression of -28 dB up to 4.0 GHz for all frequency tuning states.

The advent of Substrate Integrated Circuit (SIC) technology, and specifically Substrate Integrated Waveguide (SIW) technology has made it feasible to design and fabricate low loss and high quality factor (Q-factor) microwave and millimeter wave structures on a compact and integrable layout and at a low cost. The SIW structure is the planar realization of the conventional rectangular waveguide (RWG). In this technology, the side walls of the waveguide are replaced with two rows of metallic vias, which are connecting two conductor sheets, located at the top and bottom of a dielectric slab. The motivation for this thesis has been to develop an analytical method to efficiently analyze SIW structures, and also design different types of passive microwave components based on this technology. As SIW structures are imitating waveguide structures in a planar format, the field distributions inside these structures are very close to those in waveguides. However, due to the very small substrate height in conventional planar technologies, and also the existence of a row of vias, instead of a solid metallic wall, there is a reduced set of modes in SIW compared to regular waveguide. This fact has given us an opportunity to deploy efficient modal analysis techniques to analyze these structures. In this thesis, we present a Mode Matching Techniques (MMT) approach for the analysis of H-plane SIW structures. One of the areas of application, which can significantly benefit from having an efficient analytical method, is designing and optimizing new circuits. Having such an analytical tool, which is faster than commercially available field solvers by an order of magnitude, new components can be designed, analyzed and optimized in a fast and inexpensive manner. Based on this technique, various types of passive microwave components including filters, diplexers, power dividers and couplers, some of which are among the first to be reported in SIW technology, are designed and analyzed in this thesis. Also based on this technique, the most accurate formula for the effective waveguide width of the SIW is presented in this thesis. In order to provide means to excite and measure SIW components, transitions between these structures and other planar topologies like microstrip and coplanar waveguide (CPW) are needed. More importantly, low-reflection transitions to microstrip are required to integrate SIW circuits with active components, and therefore it is vital to provide low-reflection transitions so that the component design is independent of the influences of the transitions. In this thesis, a new wideband microstrip-to-SIW transition, with the lowest reported reflection coefficient, is also introduced. / Graduate / 0544 / zkordi@ece.uvic.ca

A transmission line format is presented which takes the form of a Multilayer Ridged Substrate Integrated Waveguide, for which signal energy is transmitted within standard PCB substrates, within a wave-guiding structure formed from conducting tracks in the horizontal plane and arrays of through-plated vias in the vertical plane. The Substrate Integrated Waveguide (SIW) is a recent development into which research is so far concentrated on single-layer rectangular variants which, like traditional rectangular waveguide, are amenable to analytic computation of the cutoff eigenvalues. Recent publications have offered empirically-derived relationships with which a Substrate Integrated Waveguide can be analysed by equivalence of the horizontal dimensions with a conventional waveguide, allowing such structures to be designed with minimal effort. We propose a ridged form of this structure, in which multiple PCB layers are stacked to obtain the desired height and the published equivalent width is used to obtain the horizontal dimensions. The proposed structure combines the increased bandwidth of ridged waveguide with SIW’s greatly reduced cost of manufacture and integration, relative to conventional waveguide, and improved power handling capacity and loss susceptibility relative to microstrip. Ridged variants have not yet been studied in the literature, however, in part because the eigenspectrum can not be obtained analytically. We thus present a semi-analytical software model with which to synthesise and analyse the cutoff spectrum in ridged Substrate Integrated Waveguide, verified by comparison with analytical solutions, where they exist, simulation in finite-element software and a physical prototype. Agreement with simulated and measured results is within 1 % in certain subsets of the parameter space and 11 % generally, and individual results are returned in times of the order of seconds. We use the model to analyse the relationship between geometry and frequency response, constructing an approximating function for the early modes which is significantly faster, such that think it can be used for first-pass optimisation. A range of optimal parameters are presented which maximise bandwidth within anticipated planar geometric constraints, and typical design scenarios are explored.

The Master’s Thesis deals with the design of slot antenna array based on the substrate integrated waveguide (SIW). Various supply methods are described and the design procedure is approached. The antenna array was designed for Wi-Fi band of 5 GHz in the Ansoft HFSS simulation software. The optimalized parameters are impedance bandwidth (low reflection coefficient at antenna input in the desired frequency band) and the gain (the maximum value). As the result of the work 3 antenna arrays based on the substrate integrated waveguide are designed and fabricated: antenna arrays 2x1, 2x2 and antenna array 2x2 supplemented with housing for outdoor use. The work also contains a comparison of simulated and measured parameters of antennas.

The Master’s thesis deals with the design of the dielectric resonator antenna array based on the substrate integrated waveguide. The work describes various feed methods of the dielectric resonator antenna and the technique of the design of the antenna. The antenna array was designed in the simulative program ANSYS HFSS at the frequency 10 GHz, subsequently fabricated and measured. The antenna array has the bandwidth of 570 MHz for S11 better than –10 dB and the gain of 12.1 dBi.

[ES] La cantidad de servicios de telecomunicación se ha incrementado signiticativamente en las últimas décadas. El uso de teléfonos inteligentes, así como el Internet de las Cosas, está generando una saturación del espectro electromágnetico. Por tanto, los requisitos de los sistemas de microondas han cambiado para adaptarse a estos nuevos avances. Para satisfacer estas necesidades, se busca el desarrollo de dispositivos de bajo coste, volumen, peso y consumo. Además, interesa que sean espectralmente eficientes y fácilmente integrables con otros dispositivos. Entre todos los dispostivos de microondas, los filtros son elementos clave dentro de los sistemas de comunicaciones móviles e inalámbricas. Es por ello que el diseño de filtros que cumplan con los requisitos mencionados se ha convertido en un tema de gran interés. Para dar respuesta a este problema ha surgido la tecnología de Guía de Onda Integrada en Sustrato (Substrate Integrated Waveguide (SIW)), que permite la implementación de filtros con un reducido tamaño y fácilmente integrables con otros dispositivos en tecnología planar. Dicha tecnología presenta unas prestaciones en cuanto a manejo de potencia y pérdidas mejores que la tecnología de circuito impreso (Printed Circuit Board (PCB)), aunque no llegan a ser iguales que las de la guía de onda clásica. Por otro lado, la saturación espectral también lleva al estudio de filtros con respuestas variables en frecuencia, es decir, que puedan cambiar su frecuencia central y ancho de banda con el fin de adaptarse a las necesidades del sistema. Por ello, el objetivo general de esta Tesis es el análisis y diseño de nuevos filtros reconfigurables en tecnología integrada. El trabajo empieza con el estudio de los fundamentos de los filtros de microondas hasta llegar al diseño de resonadores reconfigurables en tecnología SIW usando el cristal líquido como material de reconfiguración. En primer lugar, se ha estudiado la influencia que los cambios en el valor de la permitividad dieléctrica en el interior de las estructuras filtrantes pueden tener en la respuesta de las mismos. En particular, se desarrollan filtros alternando secciones de línea con y sin dieléctrico dentro de una SIW vacía, Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguide (ESIW). Una vez hecho esto, se procede al estudio de materiales que tengan un valor de permitividad dieléctrica variable de alguna forma. En concreto, se ha realizado la caracterización de diferentes mezclas de cristal líquido a la frecuencia de microondas. Dicho material cambia su valor de permitividad cuando se le aplica un campo eléctrico o magnético. Dado que para la reconfiguración de la respuesta de los filtros se requiere de una estructura desacoplada en baja frecuencia, es decir, con más de un conductor, se ha desarrollado una estrategia para el desacoplo de la estructuras ESIW, la tecnología Decoupled Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguide (DESIW). Por último, se han diseñado resonadores en dicha tecnología DESIW, que se han llenado de cristal líquido y aplicado unos campos de polarización, consiguiendo variar su respuesta en frecuencia. Dichos resonadores constituyen el elemento básico para el desarrollo de filtros de microondas. Es por ello que el conocimiento obtenido en la Tesis es una buena base para futuros trabajos esta tecnología que permitan conseguir filtros de altas prestaciones. / [CAT] La quantitat de serveis de telecomunicació s'ha incrementat significativament en les últimes dècades. L'ús de telèfons intel$\cdot$ligents, així com la internet de les coses, està generant una saturació de l'espectre electromagnètic. Per tant, els requisits dels sistemes de microones han canviat per a adaptar-se a aquests nous avanços. Per a satisfer aquestes necessitats, se cerca el desenvolupament de dispositius de baix cost, volum, pes i consum. A més, interessa que siguen espectralment eficients i fàcilment integrables amb altres dispositius. Entre tots els dispositius de microones, els filtres són elements clau dins dels sistemes de comunicacions mòbils i sense fil. És per això que el disseny de filtres que complisquen els requisits esmentats s'ha convertit en un tema de gran interès. Per a donar resposta a aquest problema ha sorgit la tecnologia de Guia d'Ona Integrada en Substrat (Substrate Integrated Waveguide (SIW)), que permet la implementació de filtres amb una reduïda grandària i fàcilment integrables amb altres dispositius en tecnologia planar. Aquesta tecnologia presenta unes prestacions quant a maneig de potència i pèrdues millors que la tecnologia de circuit imprès (Printed Circuit Board (PCB)), encara que no arriben a ser iguals que les de la guia d'ona clàssica. D'altra banda, la saturació espectral també porta a l'estudi de filtres amb respostes variables en freqüència, és a dir, que puguen canviar la seua freqüència central i l'amplada de banda amb la finalitat d'adaptar-se a les necessitats del sistema. Per això, l'objectiu general d'aquesta tesi és l'anàlisi i el disseny de nous filtres reconfigurables en tecnologia integrada. El treball comença amb l'estudi dels fonaments dels filtres de microones, fins a arribar al disseny de ressonadors reconfigurables en tecnologia SIW usant el cristall líquid com a material de reconfiguració. En primer lloc, s'ha estudiat la influència que els canvis en el valor de la permitivitat dielèctrica a l'interior de les estructures filtrants poden tenir en la resposta d'aquestes. En particular, es desenvolupen filtres que alternen seccions de línia amb dielèctric i sense dins d'una SIW buida, Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguide (ESIW). Una vegada fet això, es procedeix a l'estudi de materials que tinguen un valor de permitivitat dielèctrica variable d'alguna forma. En concret, s'ha realitzat la caracterització de diferents mescles de cristall líquid a la freqüència de microones. Aquest material canvia el seu valor de permitivitat quan se li aplica un camp elèctric o magnètic. Atès que per a la reconfiguració de la resposta dels filtres es requereix una estructura desacoblada en baixa freqüència, és a dir, amb més d'un conductor, s'ha desenvolupat una estratègia per al desacoblament d'estructures ESIW, la tecnologia Decoupled Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguide (DESIW). Finalment, s'han dissenyat ressonadors en aquesta tecnologia DESIW, que s'han omplit de cristall líquid i aplicat uns camps de polarització, i s'ha aconseguit variar la seua resposta en freqüència. Aquests ressonadors constitueixen l'element bàsic per al desenvolupament de filtres de microones. És per això que el coneixement obtingut en la tesi és una bona base per a futurs treballs d'aquesta tecnologia que permeten aconseguir filtres d'altes prestacions. / [EN] The number of telecommunication services has increased significantly in recent decades. The use of smartphones, as well as the Internet of Things, is generating a saturation of the electromagnetic spectrum. Therefore, the requirements of microwave systems have changed to adapt to these new developments and related challenges. For achieving these needs, the development of devices with low cost, volume, weight and power consumption is sought. In addition, it interests to be spectrally efficient, to offer high performance, and to be easily integrated with other devices. Among all microwave devices, filters are key elements within mobile and wireless communication systems. In this context, the design of filters that meet the aforementioned requirements has become a topic of great interest. For solving this problem, Substrate Integrated Waveguide (SIW) technology has emerged, which allows the implementation of filters with a small size and to be easily integrated with other devices in planar technology. This technology has better power handling and loss performance than Printed Circuit Board (PCB) technology, although they do not have the performance of the classic waveguide counterpart. On the other hand, the spectral saturation also leads to the study of filters with tunable frequency response, that is, they can change their central frequency and bandwidth, in order to fulfil the changing system requirements. Therefore, the general objective of this PhD Thesis work is the analysis and design of new reconfigurable filters in integrated technology. The work begins with the study of the basics of microwave filters until the design of reconfigurable resonators in SIW technology, using Liquid Crystal (LC) as reconfiguration material. Firstly, the influence that the change of the dielectric permittivity value inside the filtering structures have on the frequency response has been studied. Particularly, filters have been obtained by alternating line sections with and without dielectric material inside an empty SIW (Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguide (ESIW)). Once this is done, it is proceed to the study of materials that have a variable dielectric permittivity value. Specifically, the characterization of different LC mixtures at microwave frequencies has been carried out. This material changes its permittivity value when an electric or magnetic bias field is applied. A low-frequency decoupled structure is required for the reconfiguration of filters, that is, structures with more than one conductor. For that, a strategy for decoupling ESIW structures has been developed, i.e, the Decoupled Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguide (DESIW) technology. Finally, some resonators have been designed in DESIW technology, which have been filled with LC. The use of LC allows to tune their frequency response. These resonators are basic elements for the development of microwave filters. So that, the knowledge obtained in this Thesis work is a good basis for future works in this technology that allow for achieving high performance filters. / Sánchez Marín, JR. (2019). Reconfigurable Devices using Liquid Crystal at Microwave Frequencies in Substrate Integrated Waveguide [Tesis doctoral no publicada]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/132183 / TESIS

The recent developments in Low Temperature Co-fired Ceramic (LTCC) as a substrate material enable it to be used in the micro and millimetre wave range providing low dissipation factors at high frequencies, good dielectric properties and a high degree of integration for further miniaturised devices. The most common metallisation method used in LTCC technology is screen printing with high cost noble metals such as silver and gold that are compatible with the high sintering temperatures (850°C). However, these techniques require high capital cost and maintenance cost. As the commercial world requires convenient and low cost process technologies for mass production, alternative metallisation methods should be considered. As a result, electroless copper plating of fired LTCC was mainly investigated in this research. The main goals of this project were to carry out electroless plating of fired LTCC with sufficient adhesion and to extend the process to metallise closed LTCC channel structures to manufacture Substrate Integrated Waveguide (SIW) components. The objectives were focused on electroless copper deposition on fired LTCC with improved adhesion. Electroless deposits on the Sn/Pd activated LTCC surface showed poor adhesion without any surface pre-treatments. Hence, chemical etching of fired LTCC was carried out using concentrated NaOH solution. NaOH pre-treatment of LTCC led to the formation of flake like structures on the LTCC surface. A number of surface and chemical analysis techniques and weight measurements were used to investigate the mechanism of the modification of the LTCC surface. The results showed that the flake like structures were dispersed in the LTCC material and a material model for the LTCC structure was proposed. SEM EDX elemental mapping showed that the flake like structure consisted of aluminium, calcium, boron and oxygen. Further experiments showed that both the concentration of NaOH and the immersion time affect the surface morphology and the roughness of fired LTCC. The measured Ra values were 0.6 μm for untreated LTCC and 1.1 μm for the LTCC sample treated with 4M NaOH for 270 minutes. Adhesion tests including peel test and scratch test were carried out to examine the adhesion strength of the deposited copper and both tests indicated that the NaOH pre-treatment led to an improvement, with the best results achieved for samples treated with 4M NaOH. A second aspect of the research focused on the selective metallisation of fired LTCC. Excimer laser machining was used to pattern a resist film laminated on the LTCC surface. This process also roughened the substrate and created channels that were characterised with respect to the laser operating parameters. After patterning the resist layer, samples were activated using Sn/Pd catalyst solution followed by the electroless copper deposition. Electroless copper was selectively deposited only on the patterned LTCC surface. Laser parameters clearly affected the copper plating rate. Even with a similar number of shots per area, the tracks machined with higher repetition rate showed relatively more machining depth as well as good plating conditions with low resistance values. The process was further implemented to realize a complete working circuit on fired LTCC. Passive components including a capacitor and an inductor were also fabricated on LTCC using the mask projection technique of the excimer laser system. This was successful for many designs, but when the separation between conductor lines dropped below 18 μm, electroless copper started to deposit on the areas between them. Finally, a method to deposit copper films on the internal walls of closed channel structures was developed. The method was first demonstrated by flowing electroless copper solutions through silane treated glass capillaries. A thin layer (approx. 60 nm) of electroless copper was deposited only on the internal walls of the glass capillaries. The flow rate of the electroless copper solution had to be maintained at a low level as the copper deposits tended to wash away with higher flow rates. The structures were tested for transmission losses and showed low (<10dB) transmission losses in the terahertz region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The process was further applied to deposit electroless copper on the internal walls of the LTCC closed channel structures to manufacture a LTCC Substrate Integrated Waveguide (SIW).

An RF switch in substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) technology for X-band is designed and demonstrated. Design is based on embedding shunt pin diodes of the switch in an evanescent mode waveguide filter. At reverse bias, pin diodes formed a part of filter&#039 / s capacitances. Thus switch also functions as a filter when it is in &ldquo / on&rdquo / state. At forward bias of diodes, capacitances of the filter are short circuited to obtain a good isolation. The same circuit structure is used to design a tunable filter and an RF power limiter which also functions as a filter. Several RF functions usually used in RF frontends (power limiting, filtering, switching) are combined in a single circuit which helps miniaturization of the frontend. The circuit can be produced with standard PCB and chip&amp / wire technology. The circuits developed have comparable performances with microstrip counterparts and they are advantageous to use in microwave systems using SIW as the basic transmission medium and need filtering functionality.