The use of an interface-planarization (IP) prism in millimeter-wave ellipsometry is proposed to achieve reproducible measurements of soft, protean, and non-flat samples. The complex relative dielectric constants of a slice of bovine tissue were successfully measured at frequencies from 90 to 140 GHz using the IP prism to confirm its applicability. The use of the IP prism was found to be advantageous for protecting the sample surface from the desiccation during the measurements.

Two types of low-coherence millimeter-wave sources for photonic millimeter-wave ellipsometry are compared. A broadband signal (125-GHz bandwidth) or a narrowband one (0.5-GHz bandwidth) is used to measure the complex relative dielectric constants of purified water, and the narrowband signal is revealed to be suitable for accurate measurement.

This paper describes two promising millimeter-wave measurement techniques suitable for biological materials. One is reflection-geometry imaging using a low-coherence signal, and the other is millimeter-wave ellipsometry. Imaging porcine tissue during the desiccation process, we found the temporal variation of the reflection intensity to be well explained by an exponential decrease of the relative dielectric constant. Ellipsometry results showed that the complex relative dielectric constant also decreased exponentially with time during the desiccation process and that for bovine tissue the gradients for the real and imaginary parts of the constant were different. The implications of these results on the distribution of water in biological tissues are discussed.

The uni-traveling-carrier photodiode (UTC-PD) is an innovative PD that has a unique operation mode in which only electrons act as the active carriers, resulting in ultrafast response and high electrical output power at the same time. This paper describes the features of the UTC-PD and its excellent performance. In addition, UTC-PD-based optoelectronic devices integrated with various elements, such as passive and active devices, are presented. These devices are promising for various applications, such as millimeter- and submillimeter-wave generation up to the terahertz range and ultrafast optical signal processing at data rates of up to 320 Gbit/s.

We developed compact high-power photonic millimeter-wave emitter (PME) modules for 60-GHz fiber radio links. The PME chip is a monolithic integration of a uni-traveling-carrier photodiode (UTC-PD) and an antenna. One module was fabricated by attaching the chip and a plastic housing to a metal substrate, and the equivalent-isotropic radiated power (EIRP) of over 8 dBm was obtained with weak directivity of the radiated pattern. This module is suitable for point-to-multi-point communication. It is very compact, 29 24 6 mm. A module whose antenna gain was increased by attaching a dielectric lens to it was also fabricated, and the estimated EIRP of 18 dBm was obtained. This type of module is suitable for point-to-point communication and it too is compact, 29 24 17.5 mm. We achieved high-speed error-free data transmission of 1.25- and 2.5-Gbit/s phase-shift keyed (PSK) signal. The maximum distances of free-space propagation were estimated to be 18.2 and 8.9 m at bit rates of 1.25 and 2.5 Gbit/s, respectively.

A uni-traveling-carrier refracting-facet photodiode, a short-stab bias circuit, and a patch antenna are monolithically integrated to make a compact and low-cost photonic millimeter-wave emitter for fiber-radio applications. The device emits the maximum effective radiation power of 173 dBm at 60 GHz including a directive gain of the patch antenna.

The first results of a field trial held in November 2000, of 1 Tbit/s (25 43 Gbit/s) unidirectional Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) transmission, are presented. The field trial used a 43 Gbit/s/channel Optical Transport Network (OTN) interface prototype and standard Single Mode Fibers (SMFs) installed in the Nara area network of NTT West Corporation. The features of this field trial include the accommodation of multiple services such as GbE, STM-16 and OC-48. Error free operation of 25 channels with 100 GHz spacing over a 91 km standard SMF with Forward Error Correction (FEC) is verified for STM-16. A DV stream over IP over Ethernet as a tributary channel was also successfully transmitted.

A compact optically-fed radio access point module was developed that consists of a uni-traveling-carrier refracting-facet photodiode, a patch antenna, and an optical input interface. An output power from the photodiode was 1.4 dBm at a frequency of 5.88 GHz without any bias voltage.