Integrated Antennas and Active Beamformers Technology for mm-Wave Phased-Array Systems

In this thesis, based on the indoor channel measurements and ray-tracing modeling for the indoor mm-wave wireless communications, the challenges of the design of the radio in this band is studied. Considering the recently developed standards such as IEEE 802.15.3c, ECMA and WiGig at 60 GHz, the link budget of the system design for different classes of operation is done and the requirement for the antenna and other RF sections are extracted. Based on radiation characteristics of mm-wave and the fundamental limits of low-cost Silicon technology, it is shown that phased-array is the ultimate solution for the radio and physical layer of the mobile millimeter wave multi-Gb/s wireless networks. Different phased-array configurations are studied and a low-cost single-receiver array architecture with RF phase-shifting is proposed. A systematic approach to the analysis of the overall noise-figure of the proposed architecture is presented and the component technical requirements are derived for the system level specifications. The proposed on-chip antennas and antenna-in-packages for various applications are designed and verified by the measurement results. The design of patch antennas on the low-cost RT/Duroid substrate and the slot antennas on the IPD technologies as well as the compact on-chip slot DRA antenna are explained in the antenna design section. The design of reflective-type phase shifters in CMOS and MEMS technologies is explained. Finally, the design details of two developed 60 GHz integrated phased-arrays in CMOS technology are discussed. Front-end circuit blocks such as LNA, continuous passive reflective-type phase shifters, power combiner and variable gain amplifiers are investigated, designed and developed for a 60 GHz phased-array radio in CMOS technology. In the first design, the two-element CMOS phased-array front-ends based on passive phase shifting architecture is proposed and developed. In the second phased-array, the recently developed on-chip dielectric resonator antenna in our group in lower frequency is scaled and integrated with the front-end

Novel e-band reflection-type phase shifter - theory, design, and fabrication

This dissertation reports on the development of the E-band reflection-type phase shifters (RTPS), for applications in phased array systems. A novel 3-bit phase shifter is proposed consisting of a broadside coupled quadrature coupler and two reflective loads. This design utilizes a differential configuration providing the following benefits: 1. the easy accessibility of the on-chip short-circuit; 2. the reduction of electromagnetic interference; 3. the potential for expanding the 180° designed phase shift range to 360°, with the use of a phase inverter. Based on the fundamentals of microwave and millimetre-wave (mm-wave) circuits, theories and design methodologies of RTPS designs are discussed. Two metal layers realizing the coupler body and two extra metal layers for bridging connections of the differential microstrip lines are utilized in this design. At the reflective loads, radio frequency (RF) microelectromechanical system (MEMS) switch-controlled short-circuited microstrip lines with variable length are employed to achieve reduced loss and a large tuneable range. The phase shifter is fabricated with complex customized fabrication processes on 100 μm thick fused silica substrates. The 3-bit (9 states) differential RTPS was successfully fabricated and measured. Typically, a probe-based set-up with a 4-port vector network analyser (VNA) has to be used to measure a 4-port device; in our case, a new calibration method using differential probes with a 2-port VNA was proposed and validated. With a further characterization, by removing the measurement pads, using the distributed open-short de-embedding techniques, excellent RF performance was achieved for a tuneable phase range of 195.6° at 78 GHz. The measured reflection coefficients are below -18 dB, with an insertion loss error of less than 0.7 dB and a phase error of less than 8.6°, over the range of 70-86 GHz. At 74 GHz, the measured insertion loss varies from 3.9 dB to 4.9 dB, regarding all 9 phase states

Design, fabrication, and demonstration of low-mass, low-power, small-volume, direct detection millimeter-wave radiometers at 92 and 130 GHz

2012 Spring.Includes bibliographical references.Advances in future ocean satellite altimetry missions are needed to meet oceanographic and hydrological objectives. These needs include accurately determining the sea surface height (SSH) on spatial scales of 10 km and larger, as well as monitoring the height of the world's inland bodies of water and the flow rate of rivers. The Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission was recommended by the National Research Council's Earth Science Decadal Survey and selected by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration as an accelerated Tier-2 mission to address these needs. Current surface altimetry missions use nadir pointing 18-37 GHz microwave radiometers to correct for errors in SSH due to wet-tropospheric path delay. Using current antennas at these frequencies, oceanic measurements include significant errors within 50 km of coastlines due to varying emissivity and temperature of land. Higher frequencies (90-170 GHz) can provide proportionally smaller footprints for the same antenna size. In turn, this provides improved retrievals of wet-tropospheric path delay near the coasts. This thesis will focus on the design, fabrication, and testing of two direct detection radiometers with internal calibration at center frequencies of 92 and 130 GHz. Component design, testing and integration of the radiometers using multi-chip modules are discussed. The performance of these radiometers is characterized, including noise figure, internal calibration and long-term stability. These performance parameters, along with their mass, volume, and power consumption, will be used as the basis for the development of future airborne and space-borne millimeter-wave direct detection radiometers with internal calibration

Silicon Integrated Arrays: From Microwave to IR

Integrated chips have enabled realization and mass production of complex systems in a small form factor. Through process miniaturization many novel applications in silicon photonics and electronic systems have been enabled. In this thesis I have provided several examples of innovations that are only enabled by integration. I have also demonstrated how electronics and photonics circuits can complement each other to achieve a system with superior performance.</p

Conceptual design of a 10 to the 8th power bit magnetic bubble domain mass storage unit and fabrication, test and delivery of a feasibility model

The conceptual design of a highly reliable 10 to the 8th power-bit bubble domain memory for the space program is described. The memory has random access to blocks of closed-loop shift registers, and utilizes self-contained bubble domain chips with on-chip decoding. Trade-off studies show that the highest reliability and lowest power dissipation is obtained when the memory is organized on a bit-per-chip basis. The final design has 800 bits/register, 128 registers/chip, 16 chips/plane, and 112 planes, of which only seven are activated at a time. A word has 64 data bits +32 checkbits, used in a 16-adjacent code to provide correction of any combination of errors in one plane. 100 KHz maximum rotational frequency keeps power low (equal to or less than, 25 watts) and also allows asynchronous operation. Data rate is 6.4 megabits/sec, access time is 200 msec to an 800-word block and an additional 4 msec (average) to a word. The fabrication and operation are also described for a 64-bit bubble domain memory chip designed to test the concept of on-chip magnetic decoding. Access to one of the chip's four shift registers for the read, write, and clear functions is by means of bubble domain decoders utilizing the interaction between a conductor line and a bubble

Advances in Solid State Circuit Technologies

This book brings together contributions from experts in the fields to describe the current status of important topics in solid-state circuit technologies. It consists of 20 chapters which are grouped under the following categories: general information, circuits and devices, materials, and characterization techniques. These chapters have been written by renowned experts in the respective fields making this book valuable to the integrated circuits and materials science communities. It is intended for a diverse readership including electrical engineers and material scientists in the industry and academic institutions. Readers will be able to familiarize themselves with the latest technologies in the various fields

Conception et réalisation de commutateurs RF à base de matériaux à transition de phase (PTM) et à changement de phase (PCM)

This research work focuses on the design and realization of RF switches based on the integration of new materials such as vanadium dioxide (VO2), Ge2Sb2Te5 (GST) and GeTe chalcogenides alloys. The operating principle of these devices is based on the resistivity change presented by these materials. VO2 exhibits a Metal-Insulator transition (MIT) around 68°C for which the material changes from an insulating state (high resistivity) to a metallic one (low resistivity). The MIT transition can be triggered in different ways (thermally, electrically and optically) with low switching time. GST and GeTe alloys have the particularity to be reversibly switched between a high resistive-amorphous state to low resistive-crystalline state, under a specific heat treatment. Thanks to the non-volatile resistivity change presented by these materials, GST/GeTe-based switches are able to operate in bistable mode. The fabricated devices exhibit good electrical performances (insertion loss and isolation) over a broadband. The aim of our work is to propose an alternative solution to conventional technologies (semiconductors and RF-MEMS), to design RF switches that can be used afterward in the design of reconfigurable devices (filters, antennas).Ces travaux de recherche portent sur la conception et la réalisation de commutateurs RF basées sur l’intégration de matériaux innovants fonctionnels tels que le dioxyde de vanadium (VO2) et les alliages de chalcogénures de types Ge2Sb2Te5 (GST) et GeTe. Le principe de fonctionnement de ces composants repose sur le changement de résistivité que présentent ces matériaux. Le VO2 possède une transition Isolant-Métal (MIT) autour de 68°C à travers laquelle le matériau passe d’un état isolant (forte résistivité) à un état métallique (faible résistivité). La transition MIT présente l’intérêt de pouvoir être initiée sous l’effet de plusieurs types de stimuli externes (thermique, électrique et optique) avec de faibles temps de commutation. Les alliages de types GST et GeTe ont la particularité de commuter réversiblement entre un état amorphe à forte résistivité à un état cristallin à faible résistivité suite à un traitement thermique spécifique. Les commutateurs à base de GST ou de GeTe présentent l'avantage de pouvoir opérer en mode bistable car le changement de résistivité présenté par ces matériaux est de type non volatile. Les composants réalisés ont de bonnes performances électriques (isolation et pertes d’insertion) sur une large bande. Nos travaux de recherche visent à proposer une solution alternative aux solutions classiques (semi-conducteurs et MEMS-RF) pour réaliser des commutateurs RF qui peuvent être par la suite utilisés dans la conception des dispositifs reconfigurables (filtres, Antennes)