Methods for Attenuating and Terminating Waves in Ridge Gap Waveguide at W_Band Carbon-Loaded Foam Carbonyl Iron Paint and Nickel Plating

Several methods for electromagnetic waves matched termination and attenuation in a ridge gap waveguide (RGW) are experimentally investigated at W-band. At these frequencies, the implementation of matched loads and attenuators is especially complicated due to small sizes of RGW design features that limits application of traditional waveguide absorbing structures (e.g., absorbing sheets and finlines, ferrite insets, carbonyl iron walls, etc.). The following three techniques are considered: (i) filling an RGW gap with a carbon-loaded foam; (ii) covering a ridge (and pins) with a carbonyl iron paint; (iii) selective nickel plating of an RGW line segment. It was found that the first method exhibits a great broadband absorbing performance and can be easily implemented in a lab environment, whereas the second method can realize a more accurate and predictable attenuating performance. Finally, nickel plating allows for designing resonant RGW terminations and is more interesting from the industrial perspective

Mutual Coupling Analysis of Open-Ended Ridge and Ridge Gap Waveguide Radiating Elements in an Infinite Array Environment

In this paper, we discuss mutual coupling effects in 2-D beam-steerable antenna arrays based on open-ended ridge and ridge gap waveguide radiating elements. Considering potential applications for beyond-5G systems in W-/D-band, the radiating elements are designed full-metal realizing a high radiation efficiency. Various decoupling structures based on electromagnetic soft surfaces are applied to suppress the surface waves over the array apertures. The infinite array approach is used to analyze antenna unit cells in an isosceles triangular lattice, which results in the active reflection coefficient over a scan and frequency range. The latter is used to extract the values of the mutual coupling coefficients between the elements. The analysis demonstrates the effect of decoupling structures realizing a steep drop of the mutual coupling magnitude (≤ − 20 dB) for closely-spaced array elements. This results in a wideband (≥ 20%) and wide-scan (> 50\ub0) element beam-steering performance

Wideband Open-Ended Ridge Gap Waveguide Antenna Elements for 1-D and 2-D Wide-Angle Scanning Phased Arrays at 100 GHz

A new antenna element type based on the open-ended ridge gap waveguide (RGW) is proposed for beam-steering phased array applications. This element type is of a particular interest at high mm-wave frequencies (≥ 100 GHz) owing to a contactless design alleviating active beam-steering electronics integration. The key challenge addressed here is a realization of a wide fractional bandwidth and scan range with high radiation efficiency. We demonstrate a relatively simple wideband impedance matching network comprised of an aperture stepped ridge segment and a single-pin RGW section. Furthermore, the E- and H-plane grooves are added that effectively suppress antenna elements mutual coupling. Results demonstrate a wide-angle beam steering (≥ 50\ub0) over ≥ 20% fractional bandwidth at W-band with ≥ 89% radiation efficiency that significantly outperforms existing solutions at these frequencies. An experimental prototype of a 1 719 W-band array validates the proposed design concept through the embedded element pattern measurements

W-band Waveguide Antenna Elements for Wideband and Wide-Scan Array Antenna Applications For Beyond 5G

Energy-efficient and highly-compact beam-steering array antennas at W- and D-band frequencies are considered as future enabling technologies for beyond-5G applications. However, most existing solutions at these frequencies are limited to the fixed-beam and frequency-dependent beam-steering scenarios. This paper aims to fill in this knowledge gap by investigating various types of antenna elements as potential candidates for wideband and wide-scan arrays at W-band. We consider open-ended ridge and ridge gap waveguide radiating elements that could overcome the physical complexities associated with the integration of elements in large-scale electronically scanned arrays. An infinite array approach is used, where we have adopted a triangular array grid and introduced E- and H-plane grooves to the element design to enhance the scan and bandwidth performance. Cross-comparison of several simulated array designs leads to the final array elements with 25% impedance bandwidth over the scan range of \ub140\ub0 in both the E- and H-planes

A Mathematical Model for Ballast Tamping Decision Making in Railway Tracks

Ballast tamping is considered as an important maintenance process for railway infrastructures and has a large influence on the capacity of any railway networks. But optimizing the plan of that process is a complex problem with a high cost. This paper discusses optimizing tamping operations on ballasted tracks to improve the track geometry and reduce the total maintenance cost. A mathematical model for this problem in the literature is improved here by including the restriction on the resources (tools, workers and budget) in the model and including constant/variable values for track possession cost and available resources. The optimal solutions obtained for all instances are found by using the global optimization. Besides, a numerical study is presented to test and evaluate the model performance. The results show that the proposed model can be adopted by the infrastructure manager (IM) to make suitable tamping scheduling decisions under normal or private conditions; however, the private conditions lead to an increase of the final cost compared to that of the normal ones. Doi: 10.28991/cej-2020-03091601 Full Text: PD