This paper describes a radial open stub and its application to a simple design of a four-element planar Butler matrix. In the first stage of our work, we propose a 45-degree phase shifter composed of an eighth-wavelength delay line and a serial connection of a quarter-wavelength straight line and a quarter-wavelength straight open stub. Next, in order to improve relative-phase characteristics between output ports, we propose a 45-degree phase shifter configuration using a quarter-wavelength radial open stub instead of using a quarter-wavelength straight open stub. It is shown by simulation that relative-phase characteristics of the configuration using the radial open stub are better than that using the straight open stub at the high frequencies. Finally, an experimental UHF-band four-element planar Butler matrix is presented. Over the frequency range from 0.83 to 0.92 GHz, the experimental four-element planar Butler matrix exhibits power splits of -6.510.29 dB, return losses of greater than 13 dB, errors in the desired relative-phase difference between output ports of less than 2 degrees.

A new structure of a low-loss high temperature superconducting (HTS) filter is proposed by using quarter-wavelength coplanar waveguide (CPW) resonators. A 4-pole Chebyshev band-pass filter with the center frequency 5.0 GHz and the 0.01 dB-ripple fractional bandwidth 3.2% is designed based on the theory of direct-coupled resonator filters using K- and J-inverters. This filter is fabricated by using a high-Tc superconductive YBCO film deposited on a MgO dielectric substrate. The frequency response of the filter measured at 60 K agrees very well with the theoretical one. The insertion loss is 0.22 dB. The insertion loss of this filter is the lowest in HTS-CPW filters presented so far.

This paper describes a simple design of a broad-band four-way power divider with 45-degree phase differences between output ports. In the first stage of our work, we present a new broad-band 90-degree power divider. The phase error of the power divider here is less than one-tenth of the conventional 90-degree branch-line hybrid. Next, an experimental UHF-band four-way power divider using a broad-band 90-degree power divider and two broad-band 45-degree power dividers is presented. Over the frequency range from 0.86 to 1.06 GHz, the experimental four-way power divider exhibits power splits of -6.420.25 dB, return losses of greater than 15 dB, errors in the desired relative-phase difference between output ports of less than 1 degree, and isolation between output ports of greater than 15 dB. This divider is useful for realizing low distortion and high efficiency amplifiers without the need for an isolator.

We propose the new and highly accurate design theory of the high Tc superconducting (HTS) miniaturized coplanar waveguide (CPW) bandpass filters (BPFs) with highly packed meanderlines. BPFs are designed using the external quality factor (Qe) and coupling constant (k) (Q-k method). These parameters are estimated from the transmission coefficient obtained by the 2.5-dimensional electromagnetic field simulator. Moreover, the Q-k method is compared with the J-b method (designed using admittance inverter and susceptance slope parameter) presented previously; in this way we confirmed that the Q-k method has higher accuracy than the J-b method. We realized the design of a the highly packed meanderline CPW BPF (5 pole, center frequency = 2 GHz, fractional band width = 15 MHz, ripple = 0.1 dB) in a 3.5 mm 8 mm substrate.

We developed a compact rf receiver subsystem using a high-Tc superconducting sharp skirt band-pass filter with a center frequency tuning function. A 24-pole hairpin-type 2 GHz microstrip-line filter was fabricated with YBa2Cu3Oy thin films deposited on a LaAlO3 substrate. Attenuation characteristics were more than 30 dB at 1 MHz apart from both the lower and the higher pass-band edges. For center frequency tuning, a 1-mm-thick dielectric sapphire plate was stacked on the filter, and the filtering characteristics were tuned by moving the plate using a piezoelectric bending actuator. The range of the center frequency modulation was more than 12 MHz with no degradation of the low-loss and sharp-skirt characteristics.

A simple method for improving out-of-band characteristics of a planar microwave filter is proposed. We clarify the close relationship among 'tap connection,' 'attenuation pole' and 'spurious responses' in filter design, theoretically and experimentally. Firstly, the basic characteristics of the resonator depending on the excitation method are examined. We show that skirt characteristics can be improved and spurious responses can be suppressed by using the tap connection technique. Secondly, the application examples of bandpass filters (BPFs) on the basis of the resonator with our principle are provided. It is confirmed that the resonator depending on the excitation method is useful for improving out-of-band characteristics of the planar microwave filter.

In Chirp-Pulse Microwave Computed Tomography (CP-MCT) the images are affected by the blur which is inherent to the measurement principle and is described by a space-variant Point Spread Function (PSF). In this paper we investigate the PSF of CP-MCT including the space dependence both experimentally and computationally. The experimental evaluation is performed by measuring the projections of a target consisting of a thin low-loss dielectric rod surrounded by a saline solution and placed at various positions in the measuring region. On the other hand, the theoretical evaluation is obtained by computing the projections of the same target via a numerical solution of Maxwell's equations. Since CP-MCT uses a chirp signal, the numerical evaluation is carried out by the use of a FD-TD method. The projections of the rod could be obtained by computing the field during the sweep time of the chirp signal for each position of the receiving antenna. Since this procedure is extremely time consuming, we compute the impulse response function of the system by exciting the transmitting antenna with a wide-band Gaussian pulse. Then the signal transmitted in CP-MCT is obtained by computing the convolution product in time domain of the input chirp pulse with the impulse response function of the system. We find a good agreement between measured and computed PSF. The rationality of the computed PSF is verified by three distinct ways and the usefulness of this function is shown by a remarkable effect in the restoration of CP-MCT images. Knowledge on the space-variant PSF will be utilized for more accurate image deblurring in CP-MCT.

A Fourier-optics based imaging system for electromagnetic interference (EMI) sources is presented. It is necessary to decrease undesired emissions in order to meet EMI requirements. To investigate this problem, a visualization of electromagnetic (EM) emitting fields is very useful. In this paper, we propose a passive imaging system of EM emitting fields based on Fourier optics. Amplitude and phase values of diffracted fields on an entrance pupil are acquired by using a six-port interferometer. The measured EM fields are then processed on a computer, and an image is retrieved using an inverse Fresnel transform. Experiments are presented, which demonstrate the potential of the proposed method. The proposed system is useful not only in the field of electromagnetic compatibility (EMC), but also for scientific elucidation to discuss the optics and microwave theory of the same viewpoint.

The scatterometer is a real aperture radar capable to perform a set of normalized radar cross section measurements under different azimuth angles for each resolution cell. The main field of application of a wind scatterometer regards the sea surface wind field determination. As a matter of fact, once such measurements have been performed it is possible to determine the sea surface wind field by means of an inversion procedure. In this paper we present a novel inversion scheme which is an evolution of the procedure nowday used by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) under the Italian Processing and Archiving Facility (I-PAF). A full comparative study shows that the novel inversion scheme better behaves whenever light wind regimes are in question.

The long-term reliability of heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) continues to be a subject of great interest due to the increased acceptance of this device in a wide range of applications. The most demanding requirements for long-term reliability include high performance microwave instrumentation, X-band radar, and lightwave communication (OC-192). A significant leap in the long-term reliability performance was observed in HBT as the AlGaAs emitter material was replaced with lattice matched InGaP. A dramatic improvement in the long-term reliability was also observed in AlGaAs emitter HBT's as the turn on voltage (Vbe) was lowered. The typical failure mechanism in HBT devices at high current density and high temperature long-term reliability testing was a dramatic increase in the base current at low current densities. One of the limiting factors in obtaining MTTF in InGaP HBT was the long time required to promote failures in the HBT device. Furthermore, a large sample size is necessary to extract a reliable MTTF. Significant increases in the current density as high as 180 kA/cm2 during reliability testing was used to promote failures in order to obtain an MTTF within a reasonable amount of time. The MTTF at a junction temperature of 334C and at a current density of 180 kA/cm2 was 1159 hours. The extrapolated MTTF at a junction temperature of 150C exceeded 106 hours for all of the tested devices. An attempt to predict the MTTF of AlGaAs and InGaP HBT using a simple model based upon the fitting of the initial Gummel plots of large area devices was made. The model was based upon the estimation of the trap defect density at the base/emitter junction, the hole injection component of the base current, and the turn-on Vbe. Degradation of the HBT was assumed to occur at the base/emitter junction and this corresponded to an increase in the trap density at this heterojunction. A factor of 5 improvement in the MTTF of the reliability of AlGaAs HBT with a lower turn on voltage was estimated based upon the above model, which confirmed the experimental results. These results suggested that the emitter material is primarily responsible in determining the long-term reliability characteristics of HBT. The combination of a high effective hole barrier and a low turn-on Vbe are highly desirable for long-term reliability characteristics.

A 15-50 GHz-band GaAs MMIC variable attenuator has been developed for microwave and millimeter-wave wireless communications systems. The attenuator employs a balanced distributed configuration using shunt connected HEMT's in order to realize a broadband operation, a low insertion loss and a good impedance matching with simple control bias scheme. The MMIC was fabricated with a pseudomorphic HEMT device technology. It has exhibited an insertion loss as low as 1.6 dB with an attenuation control range as wide as 21 dB at 26 GHz. It has also shown a good linearity of an input power of more than 12 dBm at 1-dB compression point and that of 26.3 dBm at a 3rd-order intercept point.

A power combining technique using a Fabry-Perot resonator with many more active devices is investigated. The Fabry-Perot power combiner consists of two mirrors with a circular groove mounted with the active devices. The power combiner has an axially symmetrical structure and operates at an axially symmetrical TEM01n mode so that uniform device-field coupling required for perfect power combining can be realized. By numerical calculation using the boundary element method, it was shown that high combining efficiency can be obtained when the active devices are mounted in the circular groove of larger radius on either of the two mirrors. In experiments at X-band, power combining efficiency over 90% was obtained for the case of twelve devices on either of the mirrors and the output powers of the twenty or twenty-four devices on both the mirrors were almost perfectly combined.

In this paper we summarize the actual status of the GaN/AlGaN HFET power technology at DaimlerChrysler using high quality structures grown by MOCVD on sapphire or semi-insulating SiC supplied by Epitronics. High mobilites and record extrinsic transconductance and current values were achieved on devices with sapphire and SiC substrate. Small area devices with 0.3 µm gate length yield fT=43 GHz and fmax=78 GHz (s.i. SiC substrate). Load-pull characterisation have been performed on multifinger HFETs up to 20 GHz with e.g. output power levels above 3 Watt cw at 15 GHz for a single 1.6 mm device. Though the achieved results are very promising, the performance of these devices is still hampered by transient effects on different time scales. We will show in this paper that passivation of the devices by SiN could considerably improve the RF power performance as well as reduce long time constant effects present before passivation.

We studied a three-wave coupling process occurring in microwave power transmission (MPT) experiment in the ionospheric plasma by performing computer experiments with one-dimensional electromagnetic PIC (Particle-In-Cell) model. In order to examine the spatial variation of the coupling process, we continuously emitted intense electromagnetic wave from an antenna located at a simulation boundary. In the three-wave coupling, a low-frequency electrostatic wave is excited as the consequence of a nonlinear interaction between the forward propagating pump wave and backscattered one. In the computer experiments, low-frequency electrostatic bursts are discontinuously observed in space. The discontinuity of the electrostatic bursts is accounted for by the local electron heating due to the bursts and associated modification of the wave dispersion relation. In a case where the pump wave propagates along the geomagnetic field Bext, several bursts of Langmuir waves are observed. Since the first burst consumes a part of the pump wave energy, the pump wave is weakened and cannot trigger the three-wave coupling beyond the region where the burst occurs. Since the dispersion relation of the Langmuir wave is variable due to the local electron heating by the burst, the coupling condition eventually becomes unsatisfied and the first interaction becomes weak. Another burst of Langmuir waves is observed at a different region beyond the location of the first burst. In the case of perpendicular propagation, the upper hybrid wave, one of the mode branches of the electron cyclotron harmonic waves, is excited. Since the dispersion relation of the upper hybrid wave is less sensitive to the electron temperature, the coupling condition is not easily violated by the temperature increase. As a result, the three-wave coupling periodically takes place in time and eventually the transmission ratio of the microwaves becomes approximately 20% while almost no attenuation of the pump waves is observed after the first electrostatic burst in the parallel case.

For the microwave level meter based on the FM-CW radar, we analyze the spectrum correlation of beat signals and propose a measurement algorithm using the fact that there exists a peak in the spectrum correlation of beat signals when range difference is sufficiently small. This algorithm can compensate the nonlinear effect of VCO frequency sweep, making it possible to determine the range difference in a precise manner even using a practical VCO. We present some experimental results to show the validity of this algorithm.

An efficient large-signal modeling method of FET using load-line analysis is proposed, and it is applied to non-linear characterization of FET. In this method, instantaneous drain-source voltage Vds(t) and drain-source current Ids(t) waveforms are determined by load-line analysis while non-linear parameters in a large-signal equivalent circuit of FET are defined as the average values over one period corresponding to instantaneous Vds(t) and Ids(t). Output power (Pout), power added efficiency (ηadd), and phase deviation calculated by using such an equivalent circuit of FET agree well with the measured results at 933.5 MHz. Phase deviation mechanism is explained based on the large-signal equivalent circuit of FET, and it is shown how non-linear parameters, such as trans-conductance (gm), drain-source resistance (Rds), gate-source capacitance (Cgs), and gate leak resistance (Rig) contribute to positive or negative phase deviations. The difference between small-signal and large-signal S-parameters (S11, S12, S21, S22) is also discussed. The proposed large-signal modeling method is considered to be useful for the design of high power, high efficiency, and low distortion amplifiers as well as the investigation of the behavior of FET in large-signal operating conditions.

The microwave coagulation therapy has been used mainly for the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (small size tumor in the liver). In the treatment, a thin microwave antenna is inserted into the tumor, and the microwave energy heats up the tumor to produce the coagulated region including the cancer cells. At present, a problem occurs: the size of the coagulated region is insufficient, especially in the perpendicular direction of the antenna axis. In order to overcome this problem without increasing the physical load of the patient, the authors introduced a new type of array applicator composed of two coaxial-slot antennas. However, we cannot estimate heating characteristics of this array applicator precisely by using the FDTD calculation, because the use of staircasing approximation, which employs rectangular parallelepiped cells, is unsuitable for the analysis. Therefore, in this paper, we introduce the finite element method (FEM), which employs tetrahedral cells, to estimate the heating characteristics of the array applicator.

In this paper, we propose a full-wave finite-difference time-domain formulation for ferrite magnetized in arbitrary direction solving the equation of motion of the magnetization vector including magnetic loss with Maxwell's equation consistently. The FDTD formulation and algorithm for ferrite are derived from Gilbert's equation without making any restrictions on the direction of the magnetization. In order to confirm the validity and generality of the the axial independence of the formulation, full-wave analyses for a ferrite filled waveguide resonator are demonstrated and compared with theoretical results given from the conventional Polder's permeability tensor. The FDTD results of the quality factor and the resonant frequency of the resonators magnetized in off-axial direction agree very well with the theoretical results, and validity and generality of the formulation are confirmed.

A large-signal simulation program for multi-stage power amplifier modules by using a novel interpolation is presented. This simulation program has the function to make the Load-Pull and Source-Pull (LP/SP) data required for the simulation. By using the interpolation, a lot of LP/SP data can be made from a small number of measured LP/SP data. The interpolation is based on the calculation method using a two-dimensional function. By using the simulation program, we can calculate the large-signal characteristics depended on frequency and temperature of the multi-stage amplifier module. We apply the simulation program to the design of the amplifier. The calculated and measured results agree well. The accuracy of the presented interpolation is confirmed. It is considered that the presented program is useful to calculate large-signal characteristics of the amplifier module.

Although Maxwell's equations have been known for over 100 years, it was not until the last decade that they have seen regular use in applied high frequency design. The availability of sufficient computer processing capability is only part of the reason Maxwell's equations now enjoy regular application. Other developments requiring considerable effort are needed as well. These include increased attention to robustness, software testing, ease of use, portability, integration with other tools, and support. These developments are detailed in this paper.