Aluminum nitride two-dimensional-resonant-rods

Abstract

In the last few decades, bulk-acoustic-wave filters have been essential components of 3G-to-4G radios. These devices rely on the high electromechanical coupling coefficient (kt2 ∼ 7%), attained by aluminum nitride (AlN) film-bulk-acoustic-resonators (FBARs), to achieve a wideband and low-loss frequency response. As the resonance frequency of FBARs is set by their thickness, the integration of multiple FBARs, to form filters, can only be attained through the adoption of frequency tuning fabrication steps, such as mass loading or trimming. However, as the ability to reliably control these steps significantly decays for thinner (or higher frequency) FBARs, manufacturing FBAR-based filters, addressing the needs of emerging IoT and 5G applications, is becoming more and more challenging. Consequently, there is a quest for new acoustic resonant components, simultaneously exhibiting high-kt2 and a lithographic frequency tunability. In this work, a novel class of AlN resonators is presented. These radio frequency devices, labeled as two-dimensional-resonant-rods (2DRRs), exploit, for the first time, the unconventional acoustic behavior exhibited by a forest of locally resonant rods, built in the body of a profiled AlN layer that is sandwiched between a bottom un-patterned metal plate and a top metallic grating. 2DRRs exhibit unexplored modal features that make them able to achieve high-kt2, a significant lithographic frequency tunability, and a relaxed lithographic resolution, while relying on an optimal AlN crystalline orientation. The operation of 2DRRs is discussed, in this work, by means of analytical and finite-element-methods. The measured performance of the first fabricated 2DRR, operating around 2.4 GHz and showing a kt2 in excess of 7.4%, is also reported.