MM-Wave Active Antennas for Communications Applications

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The wireless industry continues to push for higher speed transmission, lower product size and cost, and greater product functionality. At the same time, increasing demands are placed on wireless devices, which are expected to be aware of their radio-wave environment and adapt to it in terms of operating frequencies, power levels and radiation characteristics. Such requirements, coupled with the realities of high-volume commercial applications, translate into several component-level technological challenges that today are barely being met: smart, frequency-agile or multiband RF circuits and antennas, increased integration levels of RF transceivers and antennas at limited cost/performance degradations, acceptable DC/RF conversion and operating efficiencies, to name only a few. These difficulties are severely compounded when operating frequencies move toward the mm-wave band, as they eventually must to avoid spectrum crowding and to permit emerging applications such as short-range multi-Gbps wireless links (i.e. 60 GHz and above). A number of exciting new materials and RF technologies appear promising, at least individually: nanometric (65 nm, 45 nm) CMOS for low-power active circuitry, GaN HEMT for high-efficiency power stages, flexible polymer-based and low-temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC)-based substrates for passives, antennas and packaging. This work focuses on active antennas and smart antenna systems that intimately combine these and other active, passive, sensing and packaging components with novel radiating structures. The proposed research addresses in several ways the major challenges associated with the development of next generation mm-wave wireless communicators and sensors. Successful realization of high-performance mm-wave active antennas using advanced system-on-chip and system-on-package approaches will have a tremendous impact on the wireless communications industry: terminals may be produced more competitively than ever before, as they will benefit from the advantages of reduced size and weight, better reliability, increased bandwidth and functionality, and lower cost (by incorporating functionality "for free" in the package).