A Series-Fed Linear Substrate-Integrated Dielectric Resonator Antenna Array for Millimeter-Wave Applications

Ke Gong,Peng Hu,Bing Jie Deng,You Chao Tu,Xue Hui Hu

doi:10.1155/2018/9672790

Abstract

A series-fed linear substrate-integrated dielectric resonator antenna array (SIDRAA) is presented for millimeter-wave applications, in which the substrate-integrated dielectric resonator antenna (SIDRA) elements and the feeding structure can be codesigned and fabricated using the same planar process. A prototype 4 × 1 SIDRAA is designed at Ka-band and fabricated with a two-layer printed circuit board (PCB) technology. Four SIDRAs are implemented in the Rogers RT6010 substrate using the perforation technique and fed by a compact substrate-integrated waveguide (SIW) through four longitudinal coupling slots within the Rogers RT5880 substrate. The return loss, radiation patterns, and antenna gain were experimentally studied, and good agreement between the measured and simulated results is observed. The SIDRAA example provides a bandwidth of about 10% around 34.5 GHz for 10 dB return loss and stable broadside radiation patterns with the peak gain of 10.5–11.5 dBi across the band.

Highlights

Dielectric resonator antennas (DRAs) have received widespread attention because of a number of advantages such as small size, high radiation efficiency, wider impedance bandwidth, low conductor loss, no excitation of surface waves, easy of excitation, and so on [1, 2]
Linear rectangular DRA arrays fed by the dielectric image guide (DIG) were investigated at X-band [6, 7], and a DIG-fed double-sided DRA array was proposed at Ka-band with a peak gain of 15.8 dBi
A series-fed linear substrate-integrated dielectric resonator antenna array (SIDRAA) is designed for millimeter-wave applications, in which four SIDRA elements are implemented in the substrate using the perforation technique and fed by a compact substrate-integrated waveguide (SIW) feeding network through four longitudinal coupling slots with a distance of λg/2, and the SIDRA elements along with the feeding structure can be codesigned and fabricated conveniently using the standard printed circuit board (PCB) process

Summary

Introduction

Dielectric resonator antennas (DRAs) have received widespread attention because of a number of advantages such as small size, high radiation efficiency, wider impedance bandwidth, low conductor loss, no excitation of surface waves, easy of excitation, and so on [1, 2]. The SIW is a high Q-structure since it is a good compromise between an air-filled rectangular waveguide and a microstrip line [20] It can minimize the radiation loss and parasitic radiation and provides a low-cost, compact, and low-profile feeding network. A series-fed linear substrate-integrated dielectric resonator antenna array (SIDRAA) is designed for millimeter-wave applications, in which four SIDRA elements are implemented in the substrate using the perforation technique and fed by a compact SIW feeding network through four longitudinal coupling slots with a distance of λg/2, and the SIDRA elements along with the feeding structure can be codesigned and fabricated conveniently using the standard PCB process. Both the SIDRA element and the SIDRAA are simulated and optimized by using Ansoft High Frequency Structure Simulator (HFSS)

Design of the Antenna Element

Design of the Linear SIDRAA

Conclusions