Electromagnetic waves in the terahertz spectral range have gained significant research focus due to their applications in various fields of science. To effectively
generate and integrate terahertz waves in systems, appropriate waveguide
design is critical. Conventionally waveguides have been used to control the propagation
of electromagnetic waves. A waveguide with low loss and dispersion is always
preferred. But achieving these characteristics is quite challenging especially if operating
in the terahertz spectral range. There are inherent material and geometric
limitations that exist for terahertz waveguides. It is therefore important to optimize
the design to enable their use in applications efficiently. This thesis investigates the characteristics of three primary terahertz waveguides
based on the underlying theory and results obtained from simulations. The three
waveguides are parallel-plate waveguides, two-wire waveguides, and coplanar striplines.
The work in this thesis mostly focuses on coplanar striplines, optimal for building a
highly efficient commercial and portable terahertz system-on-chip (TSOC). The contribution of the thesis is around the use of different types of passive components
mounted on a thin commercial Silicon Nitride membrane. A bias tee is introduced
which is a combination of interdigitated electrodes and a meander inductor.
The length of the interdigitated electrodes and the gap between them are 55 um and
5 um, respectively. The S21 parameter for this structure ranges from -24 dB/mm at
near-zero frequencies to -0.8 dB/mm at 1 THz. This indicates that the designed bias
tee can appropriately block low frequencies. Split-ring resonators are also used to act
as band-stop filters. The resonant frequency of the resonator depends on the radii of
the split-rings. In the optimized design, the internal radius of the outer ring is 25 um
and the external radius of the inner ring is 20 um. This results in a narrowband
band-stop filter with its resonant frequency centered at 701 GHz. The optimized
final TSOC design discussed in this work uses these passive components placed on
the Silicon Nitride membrane and is shown to have a total loss that is 3 dB/mm less
than any of the previous work for terahertz frequencies. / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uvic.ca/oai:dspace.library.uvic.ca:1828/12090 |
| Date | 01 September 2020 |
| Creators | Shiran, Vahid |
| Contributors | Darcie, Thomas Edward |
| Source Sets | University of Victoria |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | Available to the World Wide Web |
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