Compact high-Q Ka-band sapphire distributed Bragg resonator

Abstract

In a class of high quality (Q-) factor dielectric resonators with low radiative losses, including popular whispering-gallery mode (WGM) resonators with high azimuthal mode numbers, due to high confinement of modal field in dielectric, the Q-factor is limited by the value of inverse dielectric loss tangent of dielectric material. Metal enclosures necessary for device integration only marginally affect the Q-factor while eliminating the residual radiative loss and allowing the optimization of input and output coupling. While very high Q-factors ∼200000 are available in sapphire WGM resonators in X-band, at millimeter wave frequencies increasing dielectric loss limits the Q-factor to much smaller values, e.g. ∼50000 and ∼25000 for quasi-TE and quasi-TM modes, correspondingly, at 36 GHz. The use of distributed Bragg reflection (DBR) principle allows to push modal energy outside dielectric while also isolating it from Joule losses in metallic enclosure walls. Very high Q∼600000>tgδ has been demonstrated in X-band [C. A. Flory and R. C. Taber, IEEE Trans. Ultrason., Ferroelectr., Freq. Control 44, 486–495 (1997).] at the expense of impractically large dimensions. In this work, we report on the assembly and testing of a compact Ka-band sapphire distributed Bragg reflector cavity characterized with Q-factor seven times larger than one predicted by the material’s dielectric loss at the frequency of interest. An intrinsic Q-factor of ∼200000 is demonstrated at 36 GHz for the lowest order TM-mode of a sapphire DBR. The resonator has 50 cm3 volume, smaller than previously demonstrated DBRs.