Millimeter-wave/Terahertz On-Chip Antenna Characterization System

从无线通信和雷达到新兴的毫米波/太赫兹传感和成像系统，最先进的无线电系统在所有多样化的应用中都是高度集成的设备，封装越来越小型化。除了天线之外，几乎整个无线电电路现在都可以集成在一到两个半导体芯片上。然而，为了有效地工作，天线的大小应该在波长的一小部分范围内(在常用的无线频段中为几厘米)。这一限制现在放松了，因为我们正在迁移到微波和毫米波，并最终迁移到太赫兹(比通常使用的无线频段高1000倍)。这些新频段的波长在毫米甚至毫米的一小部分范围内，这第一次使直接在芯片上制造天线成为可能，并在一片硅或其他类型的半导体上实现整个系统。新兴的毫米波和太赫兹技术的研究兴趣和兴奋程度的爆炸性增长，不仅是因为它们具有极高的信息带宽和高分辨率/深穿透成像能力，而且还因为整个无线电系统可以安装在一到两个微小的芯片上。

State-of-the-art radio systems, in all of their diversified applications, ranging from wireless communications and radar to emerging millimeter-wave/terahertz sensing and imaging systems, are highly integrated devices in increasingly miniaturized packages. Almost the entire radio circuit, except for the antenna, can now be integrated on one or two semiconductor chips. However, for the antenna to work efficiently its size should be in the range of a fraction of a wavelength (a few centimeters in commonly used wireless bands). This limitation relaxes now that we are migrating to microwaves and millimetre-waves and eventually terahertz (one thousand times higher that commonly used wireless band). The wavelength in these new frequency bands are in the range of millimeter or even a small fraction of millimeter, which, for the first time, makes it possible to fabricate the antenna directly on a chip and realize the entire system on one piece of silicon or other types of semiconductors. The explosive growth of research interest and excitement in emerging millimeter-wave and terahertz technologies is not only due to their extreme information bandwidth and high-resolution/deep-penetration imaging capabilities, but also due to the fact the entire radio system can be put on one or two tiny chips.