Effective Antenna Simulations using CST MICROWAVE STUDIO®

Abstract

CST MICROWAVE STUDIO reg (CST MWS) is based on the finite integration technique (FIT), a very general approach, which describes Maxwell's equations on a grid space and can be written in time domain as well as in frequency domain and is not restricted to a certain grid type. A large step forward in the area of meshing was introduced by a method called perfect boundary approximation (PBA) and it allowed a technique to represent curves and inclines very accurately within a coarse discretization. One main advantage of the time domain solver of CST MWS is that the resource requirement only scales linear with the numbers of mesh nodes and therefore the problem size. Thus it is possible to handle large radiating structures and even complete arrays with more than some hundreds of radiating elements. The ability to extract a high resolution of broadband antenna data is a result of the time domain solver's ability to define and calculate a large number of farfield monitors in one single simulation run. This represents a significant performance advantage compared to non-time domain methods which entail the simulation of a large number of discrete frequencies for the broadband data extraction. However, despite having the ability to solve a vast variety of problems, other techniques have shown advantages for certain class of problem. A frequency domain method based on hexa- and tetrahedral meshing was introduced to focus on the subset of problems where this technique excelled, e.g. in narrow band antennas, electrically smaller devices or phased array unit cells. Both solvers -time and frequency domain- are completely available on a common user-interface. Examples included and demonstrated here are UWB- antennas, RF-IDs, phased arrays and antennas based on left-handed- materials (LHM). An overview of a subset of post processing features concludes the presentation.