Surface Wave Mode Reduction for Rectangular Microstrip Antennas on High-Index Materials
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Microstrip and slot antennas are used in a broad range of applications from communication systems (radars, telemetry and navigation) to biomedical systems, primarily due to their planar characteristics and low manufacturing cost1. With the recent development of microwave and millimeter-wave integrated circuits and the trend to incorporate all microwave devices on a single chip for low-cost and high density, there is a need to fabricate patch antennas on high-index materials such as Silicon, GaAs or InP. Because of their high index, these materials exhibit a pronounced surface wave excitation, thus leading to lower antenna efficiency, reduced bandwidth, degradation of the radiation pattern and undesired coupling between the various elements in an array design. Only a few approaches have been put forth to resolve the excitation of substrate modes in microstrip antennas, including using a sub-strate-superstrate configuration2, adjusting the radius of a circular patch to a critical value3, suspending the patch over an air cavity through the use of a membrane4 or over closely spaced periodic holes in the substrate5.
