In this work, a novel miniaturized compact coupler using the shunt-stubs artificial transimission lines with high and low impedances is presented. Design of the proposed coupler is accomplished by modifying the length and impedance of the branch lines in the conventional structure with the planar resonators in order to achieve branch line coupler with compact size and improvement of the performances. First part of this work is focusing on the theorical study of the proposed resonators where the equations are obtained. Secondly, the proposed coupler is designed on FR4 susbtrate, and simulated by using the EM Solver (ADS from Agilent technologies and CST microwave studio) in order to operate in the ISM band. The obtained results show good agreement with the simulations and the coupler shows a good perfo6rmance in the hole bandwidth. The size of the proposed coupler is reduced around 50% compared to the conventional design. The last part conerns the fabrication and test of the proposed coupler. The measurement and simulation results are in good agreements

Errkik, Ahmed

Latrach, Mohamed

Sardi, Azzeddine

Zbitou, Jamal

English

TELKOMNIKA (Telecommunication Computing Electronics and Control)

TELKOMNIKA, Vol.16, No.4, August 2018, pp. 1560~1567 
ISSN: 1693-6930, accredited First Grade by Kemenristekdikti, Decree No: 21/E/KPT/2018 
DOI: 10.12928/TELKOMNIKA.v16i4.9230   1560 
  
Received October 5, 2017; Revised January 28, 2018; Accepted February 12, 2018 
Design and Fabrication of the Novel Miniaturized 
Microstrip Coupler 3dB Using Stepped Impedance 
Resonators for the ISM Applications 
 
 
Azzeddine Sardi*
1
, Jamal Zbitou
2
, Ahmed Errkik
3
, Mohamed Latrach
4 
1,2,3
LMEET Laboratory, FST of Settat, Hassan 1st University of Settat, Morocco 
4
Microwave Group, ESEO, Angers, France 
*Corresponding author, e-mail: azzeddine.sardi@gmail.com 
 
 
Abstract 
In this work, a novel miniaturized compact coupler using the shunt-stubs artificial transimission 
lines with high and low impedances is presented. Design of the proposed coupler is accomplished by 
modifying the length and impedance of the branch lines in the conventional structure with the planar 
resonators in order to achieve branch line coupler with compact size and improvement of the 
performances. First part of this work is focusing on the theorical study of the proposed resonators where 
the equations are obtained. Secondly, the proposed coupler is designed on FR4 susbtrate, and simulated 
by using the EM Solver (ADS from Agilent technologies and CST microwave studio) in order to operate in 
the ISM band. The obtained results show good agreement with the simulations and the coupler shows a 
good perfo6rmance in the hole bandwidth. The size of the proposed coupler is reduced around 50% 
compared to the conventional design. The last part conerns the fabrication and test of the proposed 
coupler. The measurement and simulation results are in good agreements. 
  
Keywords: Microtsrip; Miniaturization; Low cost; High and low open stubs; ISM applications. 
  
Copyright © 2018 Universitas Ahmad Dahlan. All rights reserved. 
 
 
1. Introduction 
Recently, the modern wireless communication systems know a rapid development. The 
passive microwave circuits such as couplers [1,2], power dividers [3,4] play an important role for 
the development of the wireless communication systems. The couplers are used in transmitting 
and receiving RF and microwave systems to divide or combine power simultaneously, they are 
widely used in different microwaves circuits, such as antenna feeding networks, balanced 
amplifiers, mixers and phase shifters [5-7].  
Miniaturization, compactness and high performances of the couplers are important 
factors to meet the demand of many microwave communication systems. However, at the low 
frequencies the size of a conventional branch-line coupler is very large. Hence, the size 
reduction of this device is highly desirable for modern communication systems. Several 
techniques and methods have been developed in order to miniaturize and improve the 
peformracne of the conventional coupler [8-13], such as as shunt lumped capacitors with short 
high impedance transmission lines, two-step stubs, high and low impedance open stubs, 
stepped impedance stub lines, artificial transmission line, distributed capacitor inside the area of 
coupler, planner transformer coupling method, and discontinuous microstrip lines [14-20]. The 
use of shunt-stubs the artificial transmission lines is still the best solutions to design a compact 
coupler with high performances in terms of size, volume, facilate integration, bandwidth, easy 
fabrication and low cost. 
In this work, the appraoch of the shunt stubs of the open artificial transmission line type 
is proposed. The open stub is chosen in order to avoid the use of the vias which uses for the 
case of the short stub. So, this work is organized as follows. Section 2 focuses on theorical 
study of the proposed resonators. Section 3 presents the design of the proposed coupler by 
using the Electromagnetic solvers and discussion of the simulation results. In Section 4, the 
fabrication and measurements of the propsed coupler is presented and discussed. Finally, the 
conclusion will be presented in Section 5.  
 
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Design and Fabrication of the Novel Miniaturized Microstrip.… (Azzeddine Sardi) 
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2. Theorical Study of the Proposed Coupler 
The branch-line coupler employs quarter-wavelength transformers to realize a simple 
square-shaped configuration illustrated in Figure 1 it is generally used for distribution to 3dB of 
energy inserted from input port (port1), with a phase difference of 90° between the way “direct” 
(port 2) and the way “coupled” (port 3), while the port 4 is isolated port.  
 
 
 
 
Figure 1. Configuration the conventionnal branch line coupler 3dB. 
 
 
In order to further miniaturize and improve the structure of the conventional coupler. 
The novel resonators using Shunt-stubs artificial transmission line is proposed to design a more 
compact coupler having good performances in terms of the matching, insertion loss, isolation, 
bandwidth, miniaturization, and low cost. For the quarter wavelength microstrip line with 
impedance Z0 of the conventional coupler. The resonator combined of the T-model and open 
stubs model respectively illustrated in Figure 1(a) and Figure 1(b) is proposed to use in place of 
the conventional transmission line. 
 
 
  
(a) (b) 
 
Figure 2. Configuration of the proposed resonator structure combined of, (a) T-model and  
(b) open stubs model. 
 
 
According to the equivalence between the ABCD matrix of the quarter wavelength transmission 
and the T-model [21-23], we get a system of two equations (1) and (2): 
 
 
0
tan
2
tan( )
tan(2 )
a
a
b b
a a
Z
Z
Y
Z





 
    
 
Port 1 Port 2 
Za, a 
Zb, b 
Za, a 
(1) 
(2) 
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The equation of the open stubs depicted in Figure 2.(b) is expressed as follow [21-23: 
 
2
0
1 1 2 2
0
tan tan
tan tan .... tan
tan tan
a a
n n
a a a
Z Z
Y Y Y
Z Z Z
 
  
 

   

 
 
The obtained equations lead to determine the values of the all electricals dimensions of 
the T-model and open stubs model. Then, thanks to LinCalc tool of the ADS Agilent, The values 
obtained of all electricals dimensions are converted to the values of physic dimensions 
(L1,W1,L2,W2,L3,W3). The obtained values of the dimensions are listed in Table 1. 
 
 
Table 1. Parameters values of the proposed 
resonator combined the T-model and open 
stubs model 
Parameter Value (mm) 
L1 9.1 
W1 1 
L2 
W2 
L3 
W3 
3 
0.6 
5 
0.4 
 
 
 
 
Figure 3. Geometric structure of the proposed 
resonator combined the T-model and open 
stubs model. 
 
 
While the quarter wavelength microstrip line with impedance Z0/2 is replaced by the resonator 
combined of the combinational-model and T-model illustrated in Figure 4(a) and Figure 4(b), 
respectively. 
 
 
 
 
(a) (b) 
 
Figure 4. Configuration of the proposed resonator structure combined of, (a) 
combinational-model and (b) T-model. 
 
 
The combinational-model of the Π-model and T-model is expressed by the system of the three 
equations [21-23]: 
 
2( cos 2 4 cos 2 )
2sin 2
a a
a
a
Z
Z
  

 
  
 
2
sin 4
tan
( tan 2 )
a a
b b
a a
Z Z
Y
Z




  
(3) 
(4) 
(5) 
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Design and Fabrication of the Novel Miniaturized Microstrip.… (Azzeddine Sardi) 
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cot 2
tan
a a
c c
a
Z Z
Y
Z Z





  
 
The physic dimensions of the proposed resonator are calculated by using equations (4,5,6) and 
LineCalc tool from ADS. The final values of the physic dimensions are shown in  
Table 2. 
 
 
Table 1. Parameters values of the proposed 
resonator combined of the Combinational-
model and T-model 
Parameter Value (mm)  
L4 12  
W4 1.5 
L5 
W5 
L6 
W6 
5 
1 
4.1 
0.8 
 
 
 
Figure 5. Geometric structure of the proposed 
resonator combined the T-model and open 
stubs model. 
 
 
3. Design and simulation results 
The circuit of the proposed coupler is designed at 2.45 GHz on FR4 substrate (ε=4.4, 
tanδ=0.025) with 1.58 mm thickness. In order to verify the accuracy of the design, the simulation 
is carried out on both Momentum of ADS and CST Microwave Studio. Figure 6 shows the layout 
2D using Momentum ADS and the layout 3D using CST. As we can see, its structure is 
relatively simple as it can be fabricated on a single layer printed-circuit board, with a simple 
ground plan. The proposed coupler has an overall size of 20mm×25mm, it occupies 50 % circuit 
size compared to the conventional structure. The simulation results are compared and depicted 
from Figure 7 to Figure 9. 
 
 
 
(a) 
 
(b) 
 
Figure 6. The layout of the proposed coupler, (a) Momentum ADS, (b) CST. 
(6) 
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The simulated results of the reflection coefficient and isolation are shown in Figure 7 (a) 
and Figure 7(b), respectively. It’s well observed that a good matching and good isolation have 
obtained for the whole range of frequency from 2.2 up to 2.8 GHz. 
 
 
  
(a) (b) 
 
Figure 7. Simulated results, (a) reflection coefficient and (b) isolation. 
 
 
The Figure 8 illustrates the simulated results of insertion loss as shown in Figure 8 (a) 
and coupled factor as shown in Figure 8 (b). As we can see, the both transmission coefficients 
are around -3dB at the center frequency of the operating band ISM. 
 
 
  
(a) (b) 
 
Figure 8. Simulated results, (a) insertion loss (S21) and (b) coupled factor (S31). 
 
 
The Figure 9 shows the phase difference between the direct and coupled ports.  
The value of the phase difference is -87.51° at the resonance frequency of the ISM band. 
 
 
 
 
Figure 9. Simulated results of the phase difference between the direct and coupled port. 
(a) (b) 
  
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Design and Fabrication of the Novel Miniaturized Microstrip.… (Azzeddine Sardi) 
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4. Fabrication and measurement results 
The photograph of the prototype of proposed branch-line coupler shown in Figure 10 is 
achieved by using LPKF machine. This prototype is fabricated on printed-circuit board having 
dielectric constant of 4.4 and dielectric thickness of 1.58 mm. The S-parameters of the prototype 
are measured by an HP 8719ES vector network analyzer. In comparison with the simulated  
S-parameters, we would like to point out that the measured performance is slightly degenerated 
by not only the permittivity deviation of substrate but also the fabrication tolerance. 
 
 
 
 
Figure 10. Photograph of the fabricated coupler. 
 
 
The measured results of the reflection coefficient and isolation are depicted in  
Figure 11 (a) and Figure 11(b), respectively. It’s well observed that reflection coefficient S11  
is -12 dB, and coefficient of the isolation is -18.12 dB at the resonance frequency of the ISM 
band. 
 
 
 
(a) 
 
 
(b) 
 
Figure 11. Measured results, (a) reflection coefficient and (b) isolation 
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The measured results of the transmission coeficients S21 and S31 are illustrated in 
Figure 12 (a) and Figure 12(b), respectively. For the both coefficients, the value around -3 dB is 
obtained for the whole bandwidth of ISM. 
 
 
  
(a) (b) 
 
Figure 12. Measured results , (a) insertion loss (S21) and (b) coupled factor (S31)  
 
 
The phase difference measured between the output ports is depicted in Figure 13.  
The phase difference is 85.81° at the resonance frequency 2.45 GHz. Such value is acceptable 
for all receivers since ± 5° error is negligible and indicates good transmission percentage. 
 
 
 
 
Figure 13. Measured results of the phase difference between the ouput ports. 
 
 
The characteristics of the proposed coupler are demonstrated by the simulated as well as 
measured S-parameters of the fabricated prototype. 
 
 
5. Conclusion 
In this paper, a miniaturized compact microstrip branch line coupler is proposed and 
realized by using the planar resonators. At first, some design equations for the planar 
resonators are derived using the theory. Secondly, the proposed coupler was designed, 
simulated and fabricated at the frequency of 2.45 GHz for ISM applications. By implementing 
ADS Agilent technologies and CST studio software, the proposed coupler was etched on FR4 
substrate. Good performrances are found in terms of the matching, isolation, insertion loss and 
phase difference. The size reduction of the proposed design is 50 % with comparable 
performance as that of the conventional branch line coupler. The ease of design using standard 
etching process makes the fabrication of the miniaturized coupler simpler and with low cost. 
Finally, this prototype can be integrated into the design of microwave or millimeter-wave 
integrated circuits where the compactness of components is crucial. 
TELKOMNIKA  ISSN: 1693-6930  
 
Design and Fabrication of the Novel Miniaturized Microstrip.… (Azzeddine Sardi) 
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Design and Fabrication of the Novel Miniaturized Microstrip Coupler 3dB Using Stepped Impedance Resonators for the ISM Applications

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Design and Fabrication of the Novel Miniaturized Microstrip Coupler 3dB Using Stepped Impedance Resonators for the ISM Applications

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