11a

LEAKY MODES AND HIGH-FREQUENCY
EFFECTS IN MICROWAVE INTEGRATED

CIRCUITS
FRANCISCO MESA
University of Seville
Seville, Spain
DAVID R. JACKSON
University of Houston
Houston, Texas
1. INTRODUCTION
This article investigates the high-frequency effects that
occur when sources or discontinuities are present on print-
ed-circuit transmission lines. Although many of the con-
clusions are general, the analysis and the results will
focus on microstrip and stripline types of transmission
lines, where there is a single-strip conductor that is within
a layered structure that may contain either one or two
ground planes. Examples include the microstrip structure
shown in Fig. 1a, the covered microstrip shown in Fig. 1b,
and the stripline structure that has an airgap over the
strip conductor, as shown in Fig. 1c. (Later in the article,
the analysis will be extended to include coupling between
two strip conductors, so that the crosstalk current induced
on a passive microstrip line from coupling to an adjacent
active microstrip line can be studied.)
The analysis and results will focus on the current and
elds that are excited when a gap voltage source is located
at the origin (z =0) on an innite structure, where the
strip conductor extends from N to N, as shown in Fig. 2.
This source model allows for a semianalytical treatment of
the problem in the spectral domain, which greatly simpli-
es the solution. Other types of sources may be consid-
ered, however. Many of the conclusions also apply to
discontinuities on the line (bends, junctions, etc.),
although such discontinuity problems are not specifically
treated here.
One of the main goals of the article is to examine the
nature of the current on the transmission line that is ex-
cited by the gap voltage source, and explore what types of
spurious effects occur at high frequency. It is well known
that at low frequency, simple transmission line theory
may be used to adequately predict the current on the strip
conductor. In particular, the current I(z) predicted by sim-
ple transmission-line theory is
I(z) =
1
2Z
0
e
jk
BM
z
z [ [
(1)
where Z
0
is the characteristic impedance of the line and
k
BM
z
is the propagation wavenumber of the transmission-
line mode, which is also called a bound mode (BM) of
propagation, since the elds of this mode decay trans-
versely away from the structure (in the 7x direction), and
hence are bound to the guiding structure.
At high frequency, simple transmission-line theory is
no longer adequate to accurately predict the current ex-
cited by the gap source, for various reasons. First, it
should be noted that the definition of the characteristic
impedance Z
0
is not unique at high frequency [1]. Second,
at high frequency, the current on the strip is not solely
that of the bound transmission-line mode (as assumed in
the above equation), but it also consists of a continuous
spectrum (CS) part, which is not predicted by transmis-
sion-line theory, and which becomes more important as
the frequency increases. The analysis presented here
allows for an accurate calculation of the bound-mode
amplitude that is excited by the gap source at any fre-
quency, even when the bound-mode current is not the
dominant current on the line. The bound mode current
has the form
I(z) =A
BM
e
jk
BM
z
z [ [
(2)
where the modal amplitude A
BM
is determined by a res-
idue in the complex plane, as explained later.
The semianalytical treatment presented here allows for
a calculation of the CS current, which may become very
L
h
(a)
(b)
(c)
h
h
h
c
h
w
c
c
c
c
0
c
o
Figure 1. Cross sections of (a) a microstrip line, (b) a covered
microstrip, and (c) stripline with an airgap.
2268
important at high frequencies. The method also provides
a convenient description of the physics of the CS current.
In particular, the CS current includes the effects of
leaky modes, which are modes that radiate (leak energy)
as they propagate. The leakage may be of two types. In
one case the leakage occurs into the fundamental mode
of the substrate, which is either a surface-wave mode
or a parallel-plate mode, depending on whether there
are one or two ground planes. (When only a single ground
plane is present, the structure will be called open, since
the structure is open to free space. When there are
two ground planes, the structure will be called closed.)
Assuming that only a single substrate mode is above
cutoff (the usual case), the leakage will occur into the
fundamental TM
0
mode of the substrate. In the other
case, which only occurs on open structures, the leakage
occurs into both the TM
0
substrate mode and into
space. In either case, a leaky-mode (LM) current has the
form
I(z) =A
LM
e
jk
LM
z
z [ [
(3)
where the propagation wavenumber k
LM
z
=b ja of the
leaky mode is complex as a result of radiation loss. The
excitation of a leaky mode may cause considerable spuri-
ous effects, including power loss, interference with the de-
sired bound mode, and crosstalk with neighboring circuit
components. The semianalytical treatment presented here
allows for a calculation of the excitation of any leaky
modes that are part of the CS current. In the representa-
tion used here (and explained later), leaky modes appear
explicitly as part of the continuous spectrum if the modes
are physical, meaning that the leakage mechanism of
the mode (either into the substrate or into both the sub-
strate and into space) is consistent with the phase con-
stant of the leaky mode.
The analysis also reveals that the CS current on
the strip conductor consists not only of leaky modes
but also of a component called the residual-wave cur-
rent. The residual-wave (RW) current is the leftover, or
residual, part of the CS current that is not representable
as a sum of physical leaky-mode (LM) currents. When no
physical leaky modes are present, the RW current is
identically the same as the CS current. When physical
leaky modes are present, the CS current consists of both
the LM and the RW currents. In either case, the RW cur-
rent may become important at high frequency. The anal-
ysis further shows that the RW current consists, in
general, of two parts. One part is called the TM
0
RW cur-
rent, and exists for both open and closed structures. The
second type, called the k
0
RW current, exists only for
open structures. An asymptotic analysis shows that for
large distances z from the source, the TM
0
RW current
behaves as
I
TM
0
RW
(z) =A
TM
0
RW
1
z [ [
3=2
e
jk
TM
0
z [ [
(4)
where k
TM
0
is the wavenumber of the TM
0
substrate mode,
while the k
0
RW current behaves as
I
k
0
RW
(z) =A
k
0
RW
1
z [ [
2
e
jk
0
z [ [
(5)
where k
0
is the wavenumber of free space.
Section 2 provides a detailed description of the semi-
analytical method of analysis that is used to calculate the
strip current and the consistent BM, LM, and RW compo-
nents. The analysis shows how the total strip current is
representable as a sum of BM and CS currents, and also
how the CS current can be represented as a sum of phys-
ical LM currents together with RW currents.
In Section 3, results will be presented to show the types
of spurious effects that can occur for the various types of
printed-circuit transmission-line structures in Fig. 1, due
to the LM currents and the RW currents.
Section 4 extends the analysis and the results of the
previous sections by considering the calculation of the
crosstalk current that is excited on a passive (victim) line,
when a gap voltage source is present on an excited line. It
is shown that simple transmission-line theory can predict
the crosstalk current accurately at low frequency, using an
even/odd-mode analysis. However, at high frequency, the
CS current becomes important, and the crosstalk current
cannot be adequately described by simple transmission-
line theory.
Section 5 examines the nature of the crosstalk eld that
surrounds a printed-circuit transmission line, when it is
excited by a gap voltage source. It is seen that at low fre-
quency the eld decays away from the line fairly rapidly,
but at high frequency this is not the case. When physical
leaky modes are present, very strong focused radiation
may occur in a specific direction, leading to very high
crosstalk elds.
Section 6 concludes the article by summarizing the
most important observations and conclusions that are ob-
tained from the study of the printed-circuit transmission
line excited by a gap voltage source.
2. ANALYSIS FOR CURRENT EXCITED BY A GAP SOURCE
This section describes the theory underlying the compu-
tation of the current excited on the strip conductor of a
innite printed-circuit line by a gap voltage source on the
line as shown in Fig. 2. The substrate is a lossless dielec-
tric that can be layered and an optional metallic wall can
cover the line (in which case the structure is referred to as
a closed structure, since it is closed vertically, and radi-
ation into space is prohibited). The line is assumed to be
innite along the longitudinal direction (z) and the con-
ductors are innitesimally thin and perfectly conducting.
(Although only lossless striplike lines will be considered
here, the present approach can be extended to lossy and/or
slotlike lines with some modications.) The basic ideas of
the theory will be exposed in this section in connection
with a single microstrip line. Section 4 will treat the cur-
rent excited on a pair of coupled microstrip lines.
LEAKY MODES AND HIGH-FREQUENCY EFFECTS IN MICROWAVE INTEGRATED CIRCUITS 2269
In order to compute the surface current on the strip
conductor, J
s
=J
x
^ xxJ
z
^ zz, the following electric eld inte-
gral equation (EFIE) has to be solved:
E
t
[J
s
(x; z)] =E
gap
t
(x; z) (6)
where E
gap
t
is the tangential electric eld impressed in the
gap (where the t subscript denotes tangential) to model
the gap voltage source. This impressed electric eld is
equated to the eld that is computed from the strip cur-
rent using the transverse part of the corresponding dyadic
Greens function of the layered structure at the strip in-
terface, G
t
(x; z; x
/
; z
/
) =G
xx
^ xx^ xxG
xz
( ^ xx^ zz ^ zz^ xx) G
zz
^ zz^ zz, as the
following convolution product
E
t
(x; z) =
_
o
o
_
w=2
w=2
G
t
(x x
/
; z z
/
)
J
s
(x
/
; z
/
) dx
/
dz
/
(7)
where the translational symmetry of the grounded sub-
strate in the tangential plane has been incorporated. The
impressed eld is assumed to be
E
gap
t
(x; z) =
1
D
rect
x
w=2
_ _
rect
z
D=2
_ _
^ zz (8)
in order to give a uniform gap eld that corresponds to
homogeneous voltage drop of 1 Valong the gap (D denotes
the longitudinal width of the gap, and rect(x) =1 if 7x7r1
and is zero otherwise). For future use it is convenient to
note that the z Fourier transform of the impressed gap
eld,
~
EE
gap
(x; k
z
), of (8) is given by
~
E E
gap
(x; k
z
) = rect
x
w=2
_ _
sinc
k
z
D
2
(9)
where sinc(x) =sin(x)/x. (In the present notation,
~
AA(k
a
) de-
notes the Fourier transform of A(a) for any function A.)
Next, the EFIE is solved by means of Galerkins method
[2], for which the unknown induced current density on the
strip has to be expanded in basis functions. First, and for
simplicity of explanation, the current density will be ex-
panded using only one basis function. The extension to
include multiple basis function will be discussed after-
ward.
2.1. Single Basis Function
If only a single basis function is employed to expand the
induced current density on the strip, J
s
(x, z) will have only
a longitudinal component, J
sz
, which can be represented
by
J
sz
(x; z) =T(x)I(z) (10)
where T(x) denotes the transverse prole, which is nor-
malized to give
_
w=2
w=2
T(x) dx =1 (11)
so that I(z) actually represents the longitudinal current on
the line at a distance z from the source. Specifically, the
following basis function has been chosen
T(x) =
rect
x
w=2
_ _
p
w
2
_ _
2
x
2
_ (12)
which will give a good approximation for narrow strips.
The EFIE (6) can be then written as
_
o
o
_
w=2
w=2
G
zz
(x x
/
; z z
/
)
T(x
/
)I(z
/
) dx
/
dz
/
=E
gap
z
(x; z)
(13)
The application of the longitudinal inverse Fourier trans-
form
I(z) =
1
2p
_
o
o
~
II(k
z
) e
jk
z
z
dk
z
(14)
to the integral equation above (or alternatively, taking the
Fourier transform of both sides with respect to z) leads to
~
II(k
z
)
_
w=2
w=2
~
GG
zz
(x x
/
; k
z
)T(x
/
) dx
/
=rect
x
w=2
_ _
~
EE
gap
z
(k
z
)
(15)
The tilde above the Greens function indicates here a 1D
Fourier transform with respect to z. If Galerkins method
is now applied, (15) can be nally expressed as
~
II(k
z
)
_
w=2
w=2
T(x)
_
w=2
w=2
~
GG
zz
(x x
/
; k
z
)T(x
/
) dx
/
dx
=
_
w=2
w=2
T(x) dx
_ _
~
EE
gap
z
(k
z
)
(16)
y
w
h
x
z
c,j
0
Figure 2. Geometry of an innite microstrip line excited by a gap
voltage source at z =0.
2270 LEAKY MODES AND HIGH-FREQUENCY EFFECTS IN MICROWAVE INTEGRATED CIRCUITS
which, after taking into account (11), allows this to be
written as
~
II(k
z
) =
~
EE
gap
z
(k
z
)
D(k
z
)
(17)
with
D(k
z
) =
_
w=2
w=2
T(x)
_
w=2
w=2
~
GG
zz
(x x
/
; k
z
)
T(x
/
) dx
/
dx
(18)
It should be noted that D(k
z
) actually represents a func-
tion whose zeros are the modal propagation constants (k
M
z
)
of the innite microstrip line. A careful study of the sin-
gularities of this function in the complex k
z
plane will be
presented later in this section.
Two common techniques have been commonly used in
the literature to compute integrals such as D(k
z
): the spec-
tral-domain approach (SDA) [3,4] and the discrete com-
plex images technique (DCIT) [57]. Each is discussed
further below.
2.1.1. Spectral-Domain Analysis. As is well known, the
use of the SDA is motivated by the fact that the dyadic
Greens function can be obtained in closed form (or by
means of certain algorithms) in the spectral domain [8
10]. Thus, assuming that
~
GG
zz
(k
x
; k
z
) is known in closed
form, D(k
z
) can be expressed analytically in terms of a
spectral-domain integral involving this Greens function.
(The tilde over the Greens function indicates here a 2D
Fourier transform of the Greens function.) This is accom-
plished by rst expressing the inner integral in Eq. (18) as
an inverse Fourier transform of the Fourier transform (in
x), noting the convolutional nature of the integral, and
then performing the outer integral in x in closed form, re-
sulting in the Fourier transform of the function T(x). The
result is (assuming that T(x) is an even function)
D(k
z
) =
1
2p
_
C
kx
~
GG
zz
(k
x
; k
z
)
~
TT
2
(k
x
) dk
x
(19)
where C
kx
is an appropriate inverse Fourier transform
path from minus innity to innity in the complex k
x
plane [1113].
Since the preceding integral has to be computed many
times to obtain the current prole given by (14), it is very
convenient to minimize as much as possible the intensive
numerical effort required to compute (19). Different strat-
egies have been proposed in the literature to speed up the
overall computation of similar integrals, and one that has
been found particularly efcient is the extraction of an as-
ymptotic behavior that can be further expressed in closed
form. This involves splitting the integral (19) into two
integrals
D(k
z
) =D
s
(k
z
) D
o
(k
z
) (20)
where
D
s
(k
z
) =
_
C
kx
~
GG
zz
(k
x
; k
z
)
~
GG
o
zz
(k
x
; k
z
)
_ _
~
TT
2
(k
x
) dk
x
(21)
D
o
(k
z
) =
_
o
o
~
GG
o
zz
(k
x
; k
z
)
~
TT
2
(k
x
) dk
x
(22)
so that D
s
(k
z
) can be computed with low computational
effort. An asymptotic expression for the spectral-domain
Green function is
~
GG
o
zz
(k
x
; k
z
) =
jom
0
2

1
2joe
m
k
2
z
_ _
k
x
[ [
k
2
x
k
2
0
(23)
(where k
0
is the free-space wavenumber). Use of this ex-
pression leads to a closed-form expression for D
N
(k
z
)
[14,15].
2.1.2. Discrete Complex Images Technique. One of the
main numerical disadvantages of the spectral-domain
technique is that obtaining the longitudinal current pro-
le from Eq. (14) requires numerically evaluating the in-
tegral (21) with innite limits for each value of k
z
. This
drawback can be considerably alleviated if the discrete
complex images technique (DCIT) is used to obtain a
closed-form expression for the Greens function in the spa-
tial domain. This procedure has been employed elsewhere
[7,16,17] to deal with 2D printed lines when Eq. (6) is
posed as a mixed potential integral equation (MPIE) [18].
It is worth mentioning that the integrals to be repeatedly
computed are double definite integrals with nonsingular
integrands (except at the strip edges) that can be very ef-
ciently computed by low order GaussChebyshev quad-
ratures [17]. Our experience shows that this scheme
reduces the CPU time at least 5 times when compared to
that required by the SDA.
2.1.3. Multiple Basis Functions. The procedure shown in
the previous section is numerically accurate only for those
situations where the transverse component of the current
density can be neglected (which is usually found at low
frequencies and/or for narrow strips). In general, however,
an expansion with multiple basis functions is required.
For this purpose, the current density on the strip is
assumed to be (with q even and p odd)
J
z
(x; z) =
N
f
q=0
T
z
q
(x)I
z
q
(z) (24)
J
x
(x; z) =
N
f
p=1
T
x
p
(x)I
x
p
(z) (25)
where T
z
p
(x) and T
x
q
(x) are, respectively, the basis functions
used to expand the transverse prole of the z and x com-
ponents of the current density, and I
z
p
(z) and I
x
q
(z) are the
corresponding unknown coefcient functions accounting
for the longitudinal prole of the current density. The
termN
f
denotes the maximum order of the basis functions.
The transverse prole is accounted for by the usual
Chebyshev polynomials of the rst and second kinds
[T
n
( ) and U
m
( ), respectively] weighted by the proper
edge condition, namely
T
z
q
(x) =(2 d
q0
)
2
wp
T
q
(2x=w)
1
2x
w
_ _
2
_ (26)
T
x
p
(x) =
4
wp
jU
p
(2x=w)
1
2x
w
_ _
2
(27)
where d
mn
is the Kronecker delta. The use of this expan-
sion in the EFIE, after using Galerkins method and ap-
plying the longitudinal Fourier transform, leads to the
following linear equation system
G
xx
pp
/ (k
z
)
_ _
G
xz
pq
/ (k
z
)
_ _
G
zx
qp
/ (k
z
)
_ _
G
zz
qq
/ (k
z
)
_ _
_
_
_
_
.
~
II
x
p
(k
z
)
_ _
~
II
z
q
(k
z
)
_ _
_
_
_
_=
0 [ ]
~
bb
z
q
(k
z
)
_ _
_
_
_
_
(28)
where
G
xx
pp
/ (k
z
) =
_
w=2
w=2
[T
x
p
(x)]
_
w=2
w=2
~
GG
xx
(x; x
/
; k
z
)T
x
p
/ (x
/
) dx
/
dx
(29a)
G
xz
pq
/ (k
z
) =
_
w=2
w=2
[T
x
p
(x)]
_
w=2
w=2
~
GG
xz
(x; x
/
; k
z
)T
z
q
/ (x
/
) dx
/
dx
(29b)
G
zx
qp
/ (k
z
) =
_
w=2
w=2
[T
z
q
(x)]
_
w=2
w=2
~
GG
zx
(x; x
/
; k
z
)T
x
p
/ (x
/
) dx
/
dx
(29c)
G
zz
qq
/ (k
z
) =
_
w=2
w=2
[T
z
q
(x)]
_
w=2
w=2
~
GG
zz
(x; x
/
; k
z
)T
z
q
/ (x
/
) dx
/
dx
(29d)
~
bb
z
q
(k
z
) =
~
EE
gap
z
(k
z
)d
q0
(29e)
The current along the line can be obtained nally as
I(z) =
_
w=2
w=2
J
z
(x; z) dx =
N
f
q =0
I
z
q
(z)
_
w=2
w=2
T
z
q
(x) dx (30)
which can be recognized as simply I(z) =I
z
0
(z) because of
the normalization condition imposed on the basis func-
tions. Therefore
I(z) =
1
2p
_
C
kz
~
II
z
0
(k
z
) e
jk
z
z
dk
z
(31)
The coefcients of the Galerkin matrix (29a)(29d) can
be numerically obtained by using the SDA or the DCIT
techniques discussed in the previous sections, since the
introduction of multiple basis functions does not affect the
asymptotic or singular behavior of the corresponding
integrals.
2.2. The Complex k
z
Plane
It has been shown above that the computation of the cur-
rent on the strip I(z) requires an inverse Fourier trans-
form given, in general, by Eq. (31). It is well known that
the study of the singularities of the integrand of any com-
plex spectral integral gives very valuable information
about the integral itself [19]. In this way, references
have shown [12,13,2022] that a study of the integrand
of (31) in the complex k
z
plane provides a deep and very
useful physical insight into the nature of the current
excited on the line, and furthermore, how to decompose
the current into its constituent parts. Since the exp( jk
z
z)
function is fully analytic in the entire k
z
plane, any sin-
gularity of the integrand comes necessarily from
~
II
z
0
(k
z
)
~
II(k
z
), and therefore the present study will focus
on the poles and branch points of this latter function.
Looking at the form of
~
II(k
z
) given in (17), it can be rec-
ognized that the numerator will not show any singularity
in the k
z
plane since
~
EE
gap
z
(k
z
) is the Fourier transform of a
bounded function. Thus, the pole singularities of
~
II(k
z
) will
come from the zeros of the denominator D(k
z
) (for the case
of multiple basis functions, this function will be the de-
terminant of the Galerkin matrix), which have been pre-
viously identied as the propagation wavenumbers for
modes on the innite line. Also, the branch points of D(k
z
)
will be the branchpoint singularities of
~
II(k
z
).
The discussion above shows that the nature of the com-
plex k
z
plane dened by
~
II(k
z
) is fully determined by the
function D(k
z
). This function can be rewritten in general
(also for multiple basis functions) as
D(k
z
) =
_
C
kx
Q(k
x
; k
z
) dk
x
(32)
where Q(k
x
, k
z
) involves the spectral-domain Green func-
tion (SDGF). The expression given in Eq. (19) for D(k
z
)
makes apparent that its singularities are themselves de-
termined by both the singularities of the SDGF and the
corresponding integration path C
kx
in the complex trans-
verse wavenumber plane (k
x
).
There are two types of singularities in the complex k
z
plane: poles and branchpoints. Poles correspond to guided
modes that exist on the printed-circuit transmission line,
and the residues at the corresponding pole locations de-
termine the amplitudes of the modes that get launched by
the gap voltage source, including both bound and leaky
modes. During a path deformation to the steepest-descent
path (discussed later), the bound-mode poles are always
captured, and hence the bound-mode currents always ap-
pear explicitly in the nal expression for the current.
Leaky-mode poles may or may not be captured, however.
Leaky modes whose poles are captured are said to be
physical leaky modes, and these currents appear explic-
itly in the nal expression for the current. Leaky modes
whose poles are not captured do not appear explicitly in
the nal expression for the current, and are said to be
nonphysical. However, these nonphysical poles may still
have an inuence on the total current, by virtue of their
proximity to the steepest-descent path. This will be par-
ticularly true when a nonphysical pole is close to being
physical, so that the pole is close to the steepest-descent
path.
Branchpoints in the k
z
plane arise because of a non-
uniqueness in the evaluation of the integral (32). In par-
ticular, different paths of integration in the complex k
x
plane may be used for the path C
kx
. These different paths
may detour around the pole and/or branchpoint singular-
ities of the SDGF in different ways, resulting in different
values for the integral. This corresponds to D(k
z
) being a
multiple-valued function of k
z
. Mathematically, this may
be conveniently viewed as the complex k
z
plane corre-
sponding to a Riemann surface. On each sheet of the sur-
face a different path of integration is used in the k
x
plane
to evaluate the integral in Eq. (32).
The SDGF for an open structure such as microstrip has
singularities at particular points in the transverse wave-
number k
t
plane, where k
2
t
=k
2
x
k
2
z
. This results in cor-
responding singularities at the following locations in the
complex k
x
plane [13,2325]:
1. Branchpoints at k
x
=7k
xb
, where k
2
t
=k
2
xb
k
2
z
=k
2
0
2. Proper poles at k
x
=7k
xp
, where k
2
t
=k
2
xp
k
2
z
=k
2
sw
,
where k
sw
is the propagation constant for a proper
surface wave of the background layered structure
3. Improper poles at k
x
=7k
xi
, where k
2
t
=k
2
xi
k
2
z
=k
2
imp
, where k
imp
is the propagation constant of
an improper mode of the background layered struc-
ture
The improper modes of the background layered struc-
ture can be classied as either improper surface-wave
modes, if the propagation constant k
imp
is purely real, or
as complex leaky modes, if k
imp
is complex. (An improper
surface-wave mode is never regarded as a physical mode.
A complex improper leaky mode is regarded as being
physical if the phase constant of the mode is less than
k
0
, so that the radiating leaky mode is a fast wave with
respect to free space [26,27].)
A careful study of the integration paths in the k
x
plane,
and their evolution as the point k
z
moves in the complex k
z
plane, reveals that branchpoints in the complex k
z
plane
occur at the following locations:
p
zb
= k
TM
0
, where k
TM
0
is the
wavenumber of the TM
0
surface-wave (or parallel-
plate) mode of the background layered structure (it
is assumed here that only the TM
0
mode is above
cutoff).
i
zb
= k
imp
, where k
imp
is the
wavenumber of an improper (improper real or com-
plex leaky) mode of the background layered struc-
ture.
0
zb
= k
0
, where k
0
is the free-
space wavenumber.
The branchpoints at k
p
zb
and k
i
zb
give rise to a double-val-
ued function of k
z
(corresponding to two sheets of the k
z
Riemann surface), since circling these branchpoints twice
gives back the original function D(k
z
) at the starting point
in the k
z
plane. Thus, the path of integration in the k
x
plane in integral (32) evolves back to the original path
when the point k
z
moves twice around the branchpoint
back to the original point.
The branchpoints at k
0
zb
= k
0
have a logarithmic
character in the sense that there are an innite number
of sheets associated with these branchpoints; that is, each
time the branchpoint is circled in the k
z
plane, the path of
integration in the k
x
plane changes, and never returns to
the original path after a nite number of encirclements of
the branchpoint. The original path of integration lies in
the sheet that is denoted as the zero sheet, for which the
path of integration in the k
x
plane stays on the top (proper)
sheet of the k
x
Riemann surface.
As shown in Ref. 13, the branchpoints corresponding to
the improper modes of the background structure at
k
i
zb
=k
imp
do not appear on the zero sheet of the 7k
0
branchpoints on the k
z
Riemann surface (such branch-
points appear only on the odd sheets of the 7k
0
branch-
points). The original path of integration C
kz
, which stays
on the zero sheet, thus sees the branchpoints only at
k
0
zb
= k
0
and k
p
zb
= k
TM
0
. The branchpoints at k
TM
0
appear only on the even sheets of the 7k
0
branch points,
including the zero sheet.
The complex k
z
plane for the case of an open structure
such as microstrip line is shown in Fig. 3. The branch-
points at 7k
0
and at k
TM
0
are shown. To aid in the un-
derstanding of the branchpoints and the k
z
Riemann
surface, an example is given to connect the location of
x
x
x
x
k
z
plane
Im(k
z
)
Re(k
z
)
k
0 k
TM
0
C
B
A
x
x
Figure 3. The k
z
plane showing two pairs of branchpoints at7k
0
and k
TM0
, a pair of proper poles at 7A, and two pairs of leaky
poles at 7B and 7C.
the k
z
point on the Riemann surface with the correspond-
ing path of integration in the k
x
plane. Three points are
shown in the complex k
z
plane, labeled as A, B, and C. The
corresponding paths of integration in the k
x
plane are
shown in Figs. 4a, 4b, and 4c.
Point A is located on the real axis of the k
z
plane, and is
assumed to be on the zero sheet of the branchpoints at
7k
0
and also the top sheet of the branchpoints at k
TM
0
.
(The original path of integration C
kz
is on this sheet.) This
point corresponds to a path of integration that stays along
the real axis in the k
x
plane, shown in Fig. 4a, without
detouring around any pole or branchpoint singularities of
the SDGF.
Point B is assumed to lie on the zero sheet of the 7k
0
branchpoints, and the bottom sheet of the k
TM0
branch-
points. Such a point is obtained by starting from point A,
then moving into the rst quadrant of the k
z
plane, and
then moving down, crossing the real axis between k
0
and
k
TM
0
. In doing so, the branchcut fromthe k
TM
0
branchpoint
is crossed, to enter the lower sheet of this branchpoint on
the k
z
Riemann surface. The corresponding path in the k
x
plane detours around the TM
0
poles of the SDGF located
at 7k
xp
, but stays on the top sheet of the Riemann surface
in the k
x
plane.
Point C is assumed to be on the lower ( 1) sheet of the
k
0
branchpoints on the k
z
Riemann surface. Such a point is
obtained by starting from point A, then moving into the
rst quadrant of the k
z
plane, and then moving down,
crossing the real axis between the origin and k
0
. In doing
so, the branchcut from the k
0
branchpoint is crossed, to
enter the lower sheet of this branchpoint on the k
z
Riem-
ann surface. (As soon as this branchcut is crossed, the
branchpoints at k
TM
0
no longer appear, since these
branchpoints appear only on the even sheets of the 7k
0
branchpoints.) The corresponding path of integration
crosses through the branchcuts of the SDGF in the k
x
plane and lies partly on the improper lower sheet of the k
x
Riemann surface. The path also detours around the TM
0
surface-wave poles of the SDGF.
For covered structures such as covered microstrip, the
only branchpoints that occur are those at the wavenum-
bers of the parallel-plate modes of the background struc-
ture. Assuming that only the TM
0
parallel-plate mode is
above cutoff, there will be one pair of branchpoints on the
real k
z
axis at k
zb
= k
TM
0
. There will also be an innite
number of branchpoints on the imaginary axes, corre-
sponding to the wavenumbers of the evanescent parallel-
plate modes. The complex k
z
plane for a covered structure
is shown in Fig. 5.
x
x
x
x
TM
0
Im(k
x
)
Re(k
x
)
Im(k
x
)
Re(k
x
)
x
x
Im(k
x
)
Re(k
x
)
(a)
(c)
(b)
Figure 4. Integration paths in the transverse wavenumber com-
plex plane (k
x
) corresponding to (a) point A, (b) point B, and
(c) point C in Fig. 6.
x
x
x x
Im(k
z
)
k
z
plane
Re(k
z
)
k
TM
0
C
kz
Figure 5. The k
z
plane showing a pair of branchpoints at k
TM0
,
a pair (out of an innite number) of branchpoints on the imagi-
nary axis, and two pairs of poles.
2.3. Decomposition of the Total Current
When computing the elds of a simple source such as a
dipole in the presence of a grounded dielectric slab, the
existence of square-root-type branchpoints at 7k
0
in the
integrand of the corresponding Fourier integral is related
to radiation in the free space, namely, to its continuous
spectrum [23,24]. This principle holds for more complicat-
ed systems, such as the gap source on the microstrip line,
discussed here. The existence of branchpoints is related to
mechanisms of radiation. Thus, for the microstrip line un-
der study, the fact that
~
II(k
z
) has multiple pairs of branch-
points indicates that radiation can take place by means of
different mechanisms (or, in other words, that the contin-
uous spectrum will have different components). Speci-
cally, the 7k
0
branchpoints are related to radiation into
free space, and the branchpoints at k
TM
0
are related to
radiation in the form of surface waves or parallel-plate
modes of the background waveguide.
In addition to branchpoints,
~
II(k
z
) also has pole singu-
larities that originate from the roots of D(k
z
). It is well
known that D(k
z
) has an innite number of roots: a nite
set corresponding to bound (proper) modes and an innite
set of leaky (improper) modes [2835]. Specifically, the
different poles of
~
II(k
z
) are located as follows:
*
Bound modesthe poles lie on the zero sheet with
respect to the 7k
0
branchpoints and on the top (prop-
er) sheet with respect to the k
TM
0
branchpoints.
*
Surface-wave leaky modesthe poles lie on the zero
sheet with respect to 7k
0
branchpoints and on the
bottom (improper) sheet with respect to the k
TM0
branchpoints.
*
Surface and space-wave leaky modesthe poles lie on
the 1 sheet of the 7k
0
branchpoints.
A typical diagram of the integration path C
kz
to com-
pute I(z) together with some relevant singularities of
~
II(k
z
)
is shown in Fig. 6. The path is equivalent to a real-axis
path that runs from N to N, detouring around the
branchpoint singularities and also the bound mode poles
on the real axis.
With an understanding of the complex k
z
plane, it is
now possible to discuss the physical significance of a
particular mode. This physical significance can be dened
by the degree of excitation of this mode from a realistic
source. A mode that is physically significant should be ex-
cited by a suitable nite source, which implies that the
current I(z) on the line will then have a component that
closely resembles the current of the mode. (If a particular
mode is excited with a sufcient amplitude, this modal
component may dominate the total line current.)
One possible measure of the relative significance of
each microstrip mode can be obtained by looking at the
distance from the corresponding pole in the k
z
plane to
the integration contour C
kz
on the Riemann surface. The
term distance here refers to distance on the Riemann
surface. For example, two points on the opposite sides of a
branchcut, both on the same sheet, will not be close to
one another, regardless of how geometrically close they
are together. Two geometrically close points on either side
of a branchcut will be close on the Riemann surface if they
are located on different sheets, such that there is a con-
tinuous connection between the two points.
Since the k
BM
z
pole on the real axis corresponding to a
bound mode is on the same sheet as the integration path
C
kz
, this pole is always close to the path of integration, and
is therefore always physically significant. For the leaky-
mode poles, however, the poles may or may not be close to
the integration path, depending on which sheet they are
located, and the value of the phase constant b of each
mode. The physical significance of a leaky mode can be
summarized concisely by saying that a mode can have
physical significance only if the mode satises what is de-
noted as the path consistency condition (PCC). This con-
dition (which was called the condition of leakage in Ref.
32) states that the path of integration in the k
x
plane used
to obtain a particular leaky-mode solution should be con-
sistent with the phase constant b of the leaky mode that is
obtained by using the given path. For example, if the path
in the k
x
plane used to obtain a leaky mode is the one
shown in Fig. 4b, which corresponds to leakage into the
TM
0
mode but not into space, the resulting leaky mode
will be physically significant (or physical) provided the
phase constant of the leaky mode is in the range
k
0
obok
TM
0
. If the path in the k
x
plane used to obtain a
leaky mode is the one shown in Fig. 4c, which corresponds
to leakage into both the TM
0
mode and into space, the re-
sulting leaky mode will be physically significant (or phys-
ical) provided the phase constant of the leaky mode is in
the range bok
0
.
This physical significance of a leaky mode is directly
related to the closeness of the corresponding pole to the
path C
kz
on the Riemann surface. For example, consider a
leaky-mode pole located as shown in Fig. 6, to the left of
the branchpoint k
0
; that is, +(k
zp
)ok
0
. Such a leaky mode
is close to the path C
kz
if it is on the 1 sheet of the 7k
0
branchpoints. This means that the path of integration in
the k
x
plane is that shown in Fig. 4c. Similarly, if a leaky-
mode pole is located in the region k
0
o+(k
zp
)ok
TM0
, the
pole is close to the path C
kz
if the pole is on the zero sheet
of the 7k
0
branchpoints, and the bottom sheet of the
k
TM
0
branchpoints.
A more mathematical way of determining the physical
significance of the leaky modes, which also provide
k
z
plane
k
0
k
TM
0
k
z
BM
k
z
LM
C
kz
Im(k
z
)
Re(k
z
)
x
x x
x
Figure 6. The k
z
plane showing the integration path C
kz
, two
pairs of branchpoints at7k
0
and k
TM0
, a pair of proper poles at
k
BM
z
, and a pair of leaky poles at k
LM
z
.
additional insight into the nature of the current and elds
excited by the source, is to deform the original integration
path C
kz
to a vertical set of steepest-descent paths (SDPs)
[23,24,36]. Figure 7 illustrates this for the case of an open
structure such as microstrip (for z40).
Figure 7a shows how the original C
kz
path may be rst
deformed into a path C
BC
detouring around all the branch-
cuts (the TM
0
and k
0
branchcuts) and a set of residue
contributions C
BM
from paths that encircle all of the
bound-modes poles on the positive real axis (in the gure
only one bound mode is assumed). The total current (TC)
on the strip can be decomposed as
I(z) = j Res{
~
II(k
BM
z
)]e
jk
BM
z
z
1
2p
_
C
BC
~
II(k
z
) e
jk
z
z
dk
z
(33)
=I
BM
(z) I
CS
(z) (34)
where the residue contribution around C
BM
accounts for
the launching amplitude of the bound-mode (BM) current
from the gap source and the integral around C
BC
denes
the continuous-spectrum (CS) current on the line that is
induced by the gap source. It is interesting to note that
standard transmission-line theory only predicts the BM
current and not the CS current, which is a consequence of
the full-wave modeling of the complete current spectrum
due to the gap source. This latter current usually increas-
es with frequency and is responsible for spurious effects
observed in the line current, as shown later.
The CS current can be further decomposed by deform-
ing the C
BC
path to a set of vertical SDPs as shown in
Fig. 7b. In this deformation some leaky-mode (LM) poles
may be captured and therefore will appear explicitly in the
nal decomposition of the strip current. In particular, a
leaky-mode pole will be captured if the leaky mode is a
physical one, satisfying the path consistency condition de-
scribed previously. The residue contribution of the cap-
tured LM poles will dene the launching amplitude of the
physical leaky modes. Nonphysical leaky-mode poles will
not give an explicit contribution to the leaky-mode current
(dened from the residues of the captured poles), but the
possible inuence of such poles is automatically included
in the calculation of the residual wave (RW) currents,
which are the contributions from the path integrations
along the two vertical SDP paths. The RW currents rep-
resent that part of the CS current that is not represented
explicitly by the sum of the physical LM currents. The
total strip current can therefore be expressed as
I(z) =I
BM
(z) I
LM
(z) I
TM
0
RW
(z)
I
k
0
RW
(z)
i
I
i
RW
(z)
(35)
where
I
BM
(z) = j Res
~
II(k
BM
z
)
_ _
e
jk
BM
z
z
(36a)
I
LM
(z) = j Res
~
II(k
LM
z
)
_ _
e
jk
LM
z
z
(36b)
I
TM
0
RW
(z) =
1
2p
_
SDP
TM
0
~
II(k
z
) e
jk
z
z
dk
z
(36c)
I
k
0
RW
(z) =
1
2p
_
SDP
k0
~
II(k
z
) e
jk
z
z
dk
z
(36d)
I
i
RW
(z) =
1
2p
_
SDP
i
~
II(k
z
) e
jkzz
dk
z
(36e)
The rst term represents the currents of the bound modes
that are launched by the gap source. Usually there is only
one, and this is the desired transmission-line mode. The
second term represents the sum of all physical leaky
modes, from the residues of the captured poles. In general,
there may be two types of physical leaky modes, those that
leak into only the TM
0
mode, and those that leak into both
the TM
0
modes and into space. The next term is the TM
0
RW current, arising from the path integration along the
vertical SDP path that descends downward from the
branchpoint at k
zb
=k
TM
0
. The next term is the k
0
RW
current that arises from the path integration along the
vertical SDP path that descends downward from the
branchpoint at k
zb
=k
0
. The last series term is a set of
x
x x
x
k
z
plane
C
kz
C
BC
C
BM
k
z
LM
k
z
BM
x
x
x x
k
z
plane
C
BC
C
LM
C
BM
SDP
TM0
SDP
k0
(a)
(b)
Figure 7. (a) Complex k
z
plane showing the integration path C
kz
,
an integration path C
BC
around the branch cuts, and a residue
path C
BM
around the BM pole; (b) complex k
z
plane showing the
path deformation of C
kz
to a set of vertical SDPs, a residue path
around the captured LM pole k
LM
z
, and a residue path C
BM
around
the BM pole.
RW currents that comes from SDP paths (not shown in
Fig. 7b) that descend from branchpoints associated with
improper complex modes of the background structure.
These RW currents are included whenever the phase con-
stants of the corresponding improper modes of the back-
ground structure are less than k
0
, so that the
branchpoints are intercepted by the path deformation.
These RW currents are usually negligible because of the
large imaginary part of the corresponding branchpoints.
Although the TM
0
and k
0
RW currents do not have
closed-form expressions, it is possible to evaluate their as-
ymptotic behaviors for large z [21,36]. The calculation
shows that the TM
0
RW current behaves as
I
TM
0
RW
(z) A
TM
0
RW
e
jk
TM
0
z
(k
TM
0
z)
3=2
(37)
and the k
0
RW current as
I
k
0
RW
(z) A
k
0
RW
e
jk0z
(k
0
z)
2
(38)
3. RESULTS FOR THE CURRENT EXCITED BY A
GAP SOURCE
In this section results will be presented for the three
structures shown in Fig. 1, to illustrate the types of spu-
rious effects that may be observed in the current excited
by a gap voltage source on a printed-circuit transmission
line. The three structures are microstrip, covered micro-
strip, and stripline with an airgap. In each case plots of
the total current are presented, along with plots of the
bound mode and continuous-spectrum currents. When
physical leaky modes are present, the continuous-spec-
trum (CS) current is decomposed into the leaky-mode
(LM) and residual-wave (RW) parts, and these are shown.
3.1. Microstrip
For the microstrip structure of Fig. 1a, the current excited
by the gap source consists of a BM current and a CS cur-
rent. The CS current consists of any physical leaky modes
that exist at the frequency of interest, together with a RW
current, which consists of both the TM
0
RW current and
the k
0
RW current.
In all the cases presented, the only physical leaky mode
that is found to exist is one that leaks into the TM
0
sur-
face-wave mode, and not into space. Such a leaky mode is
physical, and hence is included in the composition of the
CS current, if k
0
obok
TM
0
. Results are presented for both
a moderate-permittivity substrate and a high-permittivity
substrate [21].
Results are rst presented for the case of a moderate
permittivity substrate, e
r
=2.2, for several different values
of w/h, corresponding to different characteristic impedances.
The substrate thickness is h=1.0mm in all cases.
Figure 8 shows the dispersion plot for a narrow line,
with w/h=0.333. For this dimension, the low-frequency
characteristic impedance is 145.8 O. A plot of the normal-
ized phase constant of the bound mode is shown, along
with a plot for the leaky mode. Also, for reference, a plot of
the normalized phase constants for the TM
0
and TE
1
sur-
face-wave modes of the grounded substrate are included.
It is observed that leakage begins at 30 GHz. Above this
frequency a leaky mode with a complex propagation wave-
number exists on the microstrip line. The leaky mode
leaks into the TM
0
surface-wave mode of the grounded
substrate. The leaky mode is an EH
0
mode, meaning that
the transverse prole of the current closely resembles the
expected quasi-TEM shape function. Below 30 GHz there
is no leaky mode, only a pair of improper real modes
(modes that are improper, but with a real propagation
wavenumber). The leaky mode becomes physical above
about 35 GHz, where it crosses the TM
0
dispersion line to
become a fast wave with respect to the TM
0
surface wave.
Figure 9 shows the total current on the strip versus
normalized distance from the source, for various frequen-
cies. In this gure, and in all subsequent results, the
length of the gap source is taken as D=0.1l
0
. It is seen
in Fig. 9 that the total current is increasingly oscillatory
as the frequency increases. This is due to the interference
between the BM and CS currents. At low frequency, only
the BM current is significant, and the current level is es-
sentially at with distance from the source. As the fre-
quency increases, the amplitude of the CS current also
increases, resulting in a stronger interference effect.
Figure 10 shows the dispersion plots for the case of a
moderate strip width, w/h=1. For this case the low-
frequency characteristic impedance is 95.2 O. Comparing
with Fig. 8, it is seen that leakage begins at a lower fre-
quency for this wider strip, although the lowering in fre-
quency is not dramatic. The leakage starts at about
27 GHz, with the leaky mode becoming physical at about
33 GHz, where the phase constant crosses the TM
0
dis-
persion curve. The leaky mode is not physical between
approximately 47 and 70 GHz, where the dispersion curve
N
o
r
m
a
l
i
z
e
d

p
h
a
s
e

c
o
n
s
t
a
n
t
1.4
1.35
1.3
1.25
1.2
1.15
1.1
1.05
1
80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0
Freq (GHz)
RIM
LM
BM
TM0
TE1
Figure 8. Normalized phase constants (normalized by k
0
) versus
frequency, for a microstrip line with a moderate substrate per-
mittivity (e
r
=2.2) and a small strip width (w=0.333mm, h=
1.0 mm). The bound mode (BM) is shown along with the leaky
mode (LM) and the TM
0
and TE
1
surface-wave modes. At low
frequency there is no leaky mode, only a pair of improper real
modes (RIM). (This gure is available in full color at http://
www.mrw.interscience.wiley.com/erfme.)
is below the unity line, so that bok
0
. In this frequency
range a physical leaky mode would be one that leaks into
both the TM
0
surface-wave mode of the substrate and into
space. However, no such physical leaky mode is found.
Figure 11 shows the current on the strip at various
frequencies, for the case of moderate strip width. Compar-
ing with Fig. 9, it is seen that the level of spurious oscil-
lations is roughly the same, although the overall level of
the current is higher for the wider strip case, because a
wider strip corresponds to a smaller characteristic imped-
ance, and hence the bound mode is excited with a larger
amplitude. However, the CS current is also excited with a
larger amplitude, giving roughly the same level of oscilla-
tions in the total current.
Figure 12 gives the dispersion behavior for a wide-strip
case, where w/h=3. For this case the low-frequency char-
acteristic impedance is 51.1 O. It is seen that the trend
of a lower leakage frequency continues, with leakage now
beginning at about 23 GHz, and the leaky mode becoming
physical at about 27 GHz. The leaky mode is once again
nonphysical in a particular high-frequency region, from
about 33 to 64 GHz.
The current plots in Fig. 13 for the wide-strip case show
a continuing increase in the overall current level, as ex-
pected. As with the other cases, the level of the spurious
oscillation increases with frequency. However, for this
wider strip case an interesting new effect is also observed.
At a high frequency of 70 GHz, the oscillations decay ex-
tremely slowly with distance from the source. In fact, out
to eight wavelengths from the source, there is no noticeable
decay in the oscillation amplitude of Fig. 13. This is because
the CS current decays very slowly with distance in this
case. The effect has been examined in detail in Ref. 22,
where it is shown that the effect is due to a leaky-mode pole
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1.4
1.35
1.3
1.25
1.2
1.15
1.1
1.05
1
0.95
80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0
Freq (GHz)
LM
RIM
TMO
BM
0
) ver-
sus frequency, for a microstrip line with a moderate substrate
permittivity (e
r
=2.2) and a moderate strip width (w=1.0 mm,
h=1.0mm). The bound mode (BM) is shown along with the leaky
0
surface-wave mode. At low frequency
there is no leaky mode, only a pair of improper real modes
(RIM). (This gure is available in full color at http://www.mrw.
interscience.wiley.com/erfme.)
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5.8
5.6
5.4
5.2
5
4.8
4.6
4.4
4.2
4
3.8
3.6
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
1GHz
5GHz
10GHz
20GHz
40GHz
Figure 11. The total strip current versus distance from the
source, for the case of Fig. 10. Results are shown for various fre-
quencies. (This gure is available in full color at http://
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1.5
1.4
1.3
1.2
1.1
1
0.9
80 70 60 50 40
Freq (GHz)
30 20 10 0
RIM
BM
LM
TM0
TE1
0
) ver-
sus frequency, for a microstrip line with a moderate substrate
permittivity (e
r
=2.2) and a large strip width (w=3.0mm, h=
1.0 mm). The bound mode (BM) is shown along with the leaky
0
and TE
1
surface-wave modes. At low
frequency there is no leaky mode, only a pair of improper real
modes (RIM). (This gure is available in full color at http://
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(
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3.4
3.2
3
2.8
2.6
2.4
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
1GHz
5GHz
10GHz
20GHz
40GHz
z/z
0
Figure 9. The total strip current versus distance from the source,
for the case of Fig. 8. Results are shown for various frequencies.
approaching the branchpoint at k
0
in the complex k
z
plane.
The frequency at which this effect occurs is given approx-
imately for wide strips by the following empirical formula
[22]:
k
0
e
r
_
w=2p (39)
In Fig. 14, the current is investigated in more detail for the
case of moderate strip width (w/h=1), at a frequency of
20GHz. Part (a) of this gure shows the total current and
its constituent parts, the BM and CS currents; part (b)
shows the CS current resolved into its constituent compo-
nents, the k
0
RWcurrent and the TM
0
RWcurrent. There is
no physical leaky mode at this frequency (see Fig. 10), so
the CS current is simply the sum of the two RW currents.
The TM
0
RW current is the stronger of the two residual
waves, although the amplitudes are somewhat comparable.
At 40GHz the situation changes in that a physical leaky
mode now exists (see Fig. 10). At this higher frequency the
oscillations in the total strip current are larger, as seen in
Fig. 15a, because the magnitude of the CS current is larger
at this higher frequency. In Fig. 15b, the CS current is
shown with its three components, the leaky-mode current,
the k
0
RW current, and the TM
0
RW current. Close to the
source, the LM current is the strongest. However, because
the LMcurrent decays exponentially with distance, the two
RW currents become dominant for larger distances. The
TM
0
RW current is the more dominant of the two, as for the
20-GHz case. The presence of the physical leaky mode
causes the level of spurious oscillation to be quite signi-
cant close to the source in the 40-GHz case, much larger
than in the 20-GHz case. Farther away from the source the
level of spurious oscillation is still slightly larger in the 40-
GHz case, but the increase is not as dramatic.
Figure 16 shows the dispersion behavior for a micro-
strip with a high-permittivity substrate (e
r
=10.2) and a
moderate strip width (w/h=1). (The leaky-mode solution
is plotted up to 37.5 GHz, which is already well within the
nonphysical region.) Comparing with Fig. 10, it is seen
that the higher permittivity has lowered the frequency at
which leakage begins. At about 24 GHz a second surface-
wave mode, the TE
1
mode, begin to propagate, and the
dispersion curve for this mode is included in the plot.
Above this frequency, there will be a third propagating RW
current, corresponding to the TE
1
branchpoint on the real
axis in the complex k
z
plane.
Figure 17 shows the current versus distance from the
source for this high-permittivity case. The level of spuri-
ous oscillations in the strip current increases with fre-
quency, as for the moderate-permittivity case of Fig. 11.
Figure 18a shows the total strip current at 20 GHz for the
case of Fig. 16 along with its components, the BM and CS
currents. In Fig. 18b it is seen that a physical leaky mode
dominates the CS current near the source, although the k
0
RW and TM
0
RW currents are not negligible, even near
the source. Because of the exponential decay of this leaky
mode, the oscillations in the total strip current die out
fairly quickly with distance.
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12
11
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
1GHz
10GHz
20GHz
40GHz
60GHz
70GHz
quencies. (This gure is available in full color at http://
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2
3
4
5
1
0
0.1
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
1
0.01
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
TC
BM
CS
CS
K0 RW
TM0 RW
(a)
(b)
Figure 14. Strip currents for the case of a moderate substrate
permittivity (e
r
=2.2) and moderate strip width (w=h=1.0 mm)
at 20GHz: (a) total current and its constituent parts, the bound-
mode and continuous-spectrum currents; (b) continuous-spec-
trum current and its constituent parts, the TM
0
residual-wave
and k
0
residual-wave currents.
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(
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10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
1GHz
5GHz
10GHz
20GHz
40GHz
quencies.
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(
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9
8
7
6
5
4
3
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(
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A
)
1E5
1E6
1E4
1E3
1E2
1E1
1E+0
1E+1
2
1
0
8 7 6 5
z/z
0
(a)
(b)
4 3 2 1 0
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
TC
BM
CS
CS
TM0 RW
K0 RW
LM
Figure 18. Strip currents for the high-permittivity case of
Fig. 16 at 20GHz: (a) the total current and its constituent parts,
the bound-mode and continuous-spectrum currents; (b) the
continuous-spectrum current and its constituent partsa leaky
mode current together with TM
0
residual-wave and k
0
residual-
wave currents.
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s
3.5
3
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
80 70 60 50 40
Freq (GHz)
30 20 10 0
BM
TM0
TE1
TM1
LM
RIM
0
) ver-
sus frequency, for a microstrip line with a high substrate permit-
tivity (e
r
=10.2) and a moderate strip width (w=h=1.0mm). The
bound mode (BM) is shown along with the leaky mode (LM) and
the TM
0
and TE
1
surface-wave modes. At low frequency there is
no leaky mode, only a pair of improper real modes (RIM). (This
gure is available in full color at http://www.mrw.interscience.
wiley.com/erfme.)
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3
4
5
6
1
0
0.01
0.1
1
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
10
0.001
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
TC
BM
CS
CS
TM0 RW
K0 RW
LM RW
(a)
(b)
Figure 15. The strip currents for the case of a moderate sub-
strate permittivity (e
r
=2.2) and moderate strip width (w=h=
1.0 mm) at 40GHz: (a) total current and its constituent parts, the
bound-mode and continuous-spectrum currents; (b) continuous-
spectrum current and its constituent partsthe leaky-mode cur-
rent, the TM
0
residual-wave, and k
0
At 40 GHz, the oscillations become stronger, as seen in
Fig. 19. As before, the CS current is responsible for the
oscillations, as seen in Fig. 19a. However, the strong CS
current is not due to the excitation of a leaky mode, as was
the case for the moderate-permittivity substrate at
40 GHz (Fig. 15). For the higher-permittivity substrate
at 40 GHz, the leaky mode shown in Fig. 16 is not physical,
since its dispersion curve is lower than that of the TE
1
surface-wave dispersion curve (while this leaky mode has
leakage only into the TM
0
surface-wave mode). Further-
more, no physical leaky mode that leaks into both the TM
0
and TE
1
surface-wave modes is found at this frequency.
Figure 19b shows that the strong CS current is due to the
TE
1
RW current. The TE
1
RW current is very strong be-
cause the dispersion curve for the leaky mode is only
slightly below that for the TE
1
surface-wave mode. The
leaky mode is therefore only slightly into the nonphysical
region. Mathematically, this means that even though the
LM pole is not captured by the path deformation to the
steepest-descent paths from the branchpoints, the LM
pole is close to the TE
1
branch point, and thus makes its
inuence felt in the TE
1
RW current.
3.2. Covered Microstrip
In practice, microstrip lines are often used in microwave
circuits that are placed into packages of some type. It is
therefore important to determine the inuence of the top
and sidewalls of a package on the possible leakage behav-
ior of various transmission lines. The effects of a top cover,
as shown in Fig. 1b, is investigated here. The addition of a
top cover still allows the same method of analysis to be
used as for the open microstrip structure, as discussed in
Section 2. Because of the cover, leakage may only occur
into the TM
0
parallel-plate substrate mode, and not into
free space (it is assumed here that only the TM
0
substrate
mode is above cutoff). Furthermore, there is only one type
of residual current, the TM
0
RW current.
One of the most important conclusions, demonstrated
from the results below, is that the presence of the top cover
lowers the frequency at which leakage begins. This is be-
cause the top cover significantly raises the dispersion plot
of the TM
0
mode, while inuencing the dispersion plot of
the guided mode to a lesser degree. Hence, physical leak-
age begins at a lower frequency with the top cover.
Furthermore, it is demonstrated that the top cover also
increases the overall amplitude of the CS current. Hence,
spurious effects significantly increase due to the presence
of the top cover.
Figure 20 presents a dispersion plot for a moderate
permittivity substrate (e
r
=2.2) and a stripwidth: sub-
strate-height ratio of w/h=1, for uncovered microstrip.
This result is the same as that shown in Fig. 10, except
that the result is plotted in a normalized form, versus the
electrical thickness of the substrate h/l
0
. (Although the
result in Fig. 10 is plotted against frequency using xed
dimensions in millimeters instead of plotting versus nor-
malized electrical substrate thickness, the result is just as
general, since it can be directly converted into a result for
normalized substrate thickness, following the style of
Ref. 37.) For the uncovered microstrip, the splitting point
(the frequency at which leakage rst begins as a nonphys-
ical leaky mode) is at about h/l
0
=0.09, and the frequency
at which the leaky mode enters the physical fast-wave
region is at about h/l
0
=0.11. Clearly, physical leakage on
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3
2
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0
7
6
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4
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
(a)
(b)
3 2 1 0
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(
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0.001
0.01
0.1
1
10
TC
BM
CS
CS
K0 RW
TM0 RW
TE1 RW
8 7 6 5 4
z/z
0
3 2 1 0
Figure 19. Strip currents for the high-permittivity case of Fig.
16 at 40GHz: (a) the total current and its constituent parts, the
bound-mode and continuous-spectrum currents; (b) the continu-
ous-spectrum current and its constituent partsa leaky mode
current together with TM
0
residual-wave, TE
1
residual-wave, and
k
0
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1
1.05
1.1
1.15
1.2
1.25
1.3
1.35
1.4
0.12 0.1 0.08 0.06
h/z
0
0.04 0.02 0
TM0 mode
Bound mode
Leaky mode
Improper real modes
Figure 20. Dispersion plot showing the normalized phase con-
stant versus normalized frequency for an open microstrip line
(w/h=1.0, e
r
=2.2).
typical microstrip lines occurs only for high frequencies or
thicker substrates.
Figures 21a21c show the dispersion curves for cover
heights of h
c
/h=2.0, 1.0, and 0.5, respectively, showing
the changes in the dispersion plots as the top cover is
brought successively nearer to the strip.
For a cover height h
c
/h=1.0, the frequency at which
leakage begins is approximately h/l
0
=0.02. When the
cover height is reduced still further to h
c
/h=0.05, leak-
age now occurs at all frequencies. These results clearly
demonstrate that for smaller cover heights the potential
exists for spurious effects such as crosstalk and power loss
due to the leaky mode. An investigation into the current
excited on the strip by a gap voltage source, presented
next, will conrm this.
Figure 22 shows a plot of the current for the uncovered
case of Fig. 20, at a moderate frequency (h/l
0
=0.04). At
this frequency we may note from Fig. 20 that there is no
leaky mode, so that the continuous spectrum consists only
of the residual wave. From Fig. 22 it is seen that the CS
current is very small, and that the total strip current is
essentially the same as that of only the bound mode. The
residual wave is therefore very small. At this moderate
frequency the continuous spectrum is small enough that
no serious spurious effects are observed. Of course, signif-
icant spurious effects will be observed at higher frequen-
cies, as demonstrated in Section 3.1, but at this relatively
low frequency the spurious effects are quite small.
Figure 23 shows a plot of the current for the same
moderate-permittivity case as in Fig. 22, but for a cover
height of h
c
/h=1.0. The normalized frequency is h/l
0
=
0.02 (half of the value used in Fig. 22). Even though the
frequency is half that used in the uncovered case, the
spurious oscillations are clearly much more severe. From
Fig. 21b it is seen that the leaky mode is not physical at
this frequency, so the CS current consists entirely of the
RW current. Hence, one conclusion is that the presence of
a top cover increases the amplitude of the RW current.
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s
1
1.05
1.1
1.15
1.2
1.25
1.3
1.35
1.4
0.12 0.1 0.08 0.06
h/z
0
(a)
(b)
(c)
0.04 0.02 0
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1.1
1.15
1.2
1.25
1.3
1.4
1.35
0.08 0.06
h/z
0
0.04 0.02 0
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s
1.15
1.2
1.25
1.3
1.35
0.08 0.06
h/z
0
0.04 0.02 0
TM0 mode
Bound mode
Leaky mode
Improper real modes
Figure 21. Dispersion plot showing the normalized phase con-
stant versus normalized frequency for a covered microstrip line
(w/h=1.0, e
r
=2.2). The cover heights are (a) h
c
/h=2.0, (b) h
c
/h=
1.0, and (c) h
c
/h=0.5.
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(
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6
5
4
3
2
1
0
1 0 2 3 4 5
z/z
0
6 7 8
Total current
Bound mode
Continuous spectrum
Figure 22. Plots of the total current, BM current, and CS cur-
rent on an uncovered microstrip line versus normalized distance
from the delta gap voltage source at h/l
0
=0.04 (w/h=1.0,
e
r
=2.2).
Figure 24a shows the current for the case of a smaller
cover height, h
c
/h=0.5, at the same normalized frequency
of h/l
0
=0.02. All other parameters remain the same as in
Fig. 23. (See Fig. 21c for a dispersion plot.) This gure re-
veals two important aspects about the effects of reducing
the cover height:
1. The level of oscillation in the total current has in-
creased significantly, compared to that in Fig. 23,
which corresponds to the same frequency. This is
partly because lowering the cover height has de-
creased the amplitude of the bound mode, but even
more importantly, it has dramatically increased the
amplitude of the CS current. Part (b) of Fig. 24
shows that the leaky mode is now the main compo-
nent of the CS current.
2. Comparing Figs. 24b and 23, it is also seen that the
RWcurrent is somewhat stronger for the lower cover
height. (In Fig. 23 there is no physical leaky mode at
this frequency, so the RW current is the same as the
CS current.) However, the main reason why the CS
current is significantly larger in Fig. 24 is the pres-
ence of the very strong leaky mode. Hence, lowering
the top cover both increases the amplitude of the RW
current and also results in the excitation of a strong
LM current.
3.3. Stripline with an Airgap
The stripline structure is one of the most well known and
widely used printed-circuit transmission-line structures.
A homogeneous stripline structure will support only a
TEM mode of propagation, and no leaky modes. This is
because the substrate between the two ground planes is
homogeneous. However, during manufacture, an airgap
may be inadvertently introduced, resulting in the airgap
stripline structure shown in Fig. 1c. It has been known for
some time that airgaps within stripline packages can de-
grade the performance of the stripline, although the fun-
damental reasons were perhaps not clear. It is shown here
that the airgap lowers the phase constant of the dominant
quasi-TEM stripline mode below that of the TM
0
parallel-
plate mode of the (now inhomogeneous) background struc-
ture. This causes the stripline mode to become a physical
leaky mode. This means that the stripline mode used for
signal transmission will suffer from power loss due to
leakage, as well as crosstalk and other effects due to leak-
age into the TM
0
mode.
When a small airgap is present, it is shown that there is
a bound mode present, as well as the leaky mode. Howev-
er, the bound mode is one that has the eld characteristics
of a parallel-plate type of mode. In fact, as the airgap
thickness tends to zero, the bound mode evolves into a
TEM parallel-plate mode. A conventional stripline feed
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7
5
4
3
2
1
0
1 0 2 3 4 5
z/z
0
6 7 8
Total current
Bound mode
Continuous spectrum
Figure 23. Plots of the total current, BM current, and CS cur-
rent on a covered microstrip line versus normalized distance from
the delta gap voltage source at h/l
0
=0.02 (h
c
/h=1.0, w/h=1.0,
e
r
=2.2).
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p
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i
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u
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(
m
A
)
7
8
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
1 0 2 3 4 5
z/z
0
(a)
(b)
6 7 8
Total current
Bound mode
Continuous spectrum
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(
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)
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
1 0 2 3 4 5
z/z
0
6 7 8
Continuous spectrum
Leaky mode
Residual wave
Figure 24. (a) Plot of the total current, BM current, and CS cur-
rent on a covered microstrip line versus distance from the delta
gap voltage source, for e
r
=2.2, w/h=1.0, and a cover height of
h
c
/h=0.5, with normalized frequency h/l
0
=0.02; (b) the CS cur-
rent is shown along with its constituent parts: the LM current
and the TM
0
RW current.
would predominantly excite the leaky mode, since this is
the mode that resembles the TEM stripline mode that
would exist with no airgap. However, a practical feed will
also excite the bound-mode eld to some extent, more so as
the airgap thickness increases, since the elds of the leaky
and bound modes tend to become less distinct as the air-
gap thickness increases. The fact that both a leaky mode
and a bound mode are excited means that spurious oscil-
lations will occur in the strip current, as was observed in
the results presented for the previous two structures, mi-
crostrip and covered microstrip. This interference ex-
plains the experimental observation in Ref. 11, which
was subsequently investigated more thoroughly in [20],
where a very sharp and pronounced spurious dip in the
transmission (S
21
) response was observed at a specific fre-
quency, using the airgap stripline. The spurious dip that
was observed was attributed to interference between the
bound mode and the leaky mode, and this is proved by an
examination of the currents excited by a gap voltage
source.
The normalized phase and attenuation constants at
30 GHz are plotted with respect to the airgap thickness in
Figs. 25a and 25b, respectively. It is seen from part (a) that
the LM will be a physical mode (a fast-wave solution with
respect to the TM
0
parallel-plate mode) for an airgap
thickness less than 0.5 mm. The physical validity of the
leaky mode is gradually lost as the airgap thickness
increases beyond this value.
For an airgap thickness of d =0.3mm, plots of the total
current as well as the BM and CS currents are shown in
Fig. 26a. Figure 26b shows the CS current and its two
constituent parts, the LM current and the RWcurrent. For
this airgap thickness, Fig. 26a shows that the CS current
is much more strongly excited than the BM current. More-
over, the curves in Fig. 26b show that the CS current is
almost entirely accounted for by the LM current. This is
because the leaky mode is physical for this airgap thick-
ness, and because the eld of the leaky mode resembles
that of the usual TEM stripline mode, and hence is excited
quite strongly by the gap voltage source. The dip in the
N
o
r
m
a
l
i
z
e
d

p
h
a
s
e

c
o
n
s
t
a
n
t
s
1.44
1.4
1.36
1.32
1.28
N
o
r
m
a
l
i
z
e
d

a
t
t
e
n
.

c
o
n
s
t
a
n
t
1.48
0.7
o (mm)
0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3
(a)
0.2 0.1 0
0.7
o (mm)
0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3
(b)
0.2 0.1 0
0
0.002
0.004
0.006
0.008
0.01
TM0
Bound
Leaky
Figure 25. (a) The normalized phase constants of the bound
mode, leaky mode, and TM
0
mode of the parallel-plate back-
ground structure, versus airgap thickness at 3.0 GHz; (b) the nor-
malized attenuation constant of the leaky mode (h=1.0 mm,
w=1.0 mm, e
r
=2.2).
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0 5 10 15
z/z
0
(a)
(b)
20 25 30
Total current
Continuous spectrum
Bound mode
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0 5 10 15
z/z
0
20 25 30
Continuous spectrum
Leaky mode
Residual wave
Figure 26. Plots of the total current, bound-mode current, and
continuous-spectrum current versus distance from the delta gap
source for the structure of Fig. 25 with an airgap thickness of
0.3 mm; (b) plots of the continuous-spectrum, leaky-mode, and
amplitude of the total current at about 25 wavelengths
from the source is due to the destructive interference be-
tween the BM and CS currents, which have an approxi-
mate 1801 phase difference at this distance. Because the
LM current dominates the CS current, it is concluded that
the dip in the total current magnitude is due to a destruc-
tive interference between the bound and leaky modes that
are excited by the source.
At the point of destructive interference, the amplitudes
of the leaky and bound modes are not necessarily equal,
and this explains why the dip in the total current does not
extend complexly to zero in Fig. 26a at z =25l
0
. However,
by correct selection of the airgap thickness, the ampli-
tudes of the two modes can be made equal, resulting in an
essentially complete destructive interference. A smaller
airgap thickness will cause the amplitude of the leaky
mode to dominate the amplitude of the bound mode at the
point of destructive interference, while a larger airgap
thickness will cause the amplitude of the bound mode to
dominate. A critical airgap thickness thus exists that
equalizes the two amplitudes at the interference point.
This is demonstrated in Fig. 27 for airgap thickness of
d =0.353 mm. For this case there is an almost perfect can-
cellation of the total current on the strip at z =32l
0
, point-
ing out how the simultaneous presence of the LM and the
BM currents can significantly distort the expected trans-
mission behavior of the line.
4. CROSSTALK BETWEEN TWO MICROSTRIP LINES
This section investigates the current excited on a pair of
coupled microstrip lines when one of the lines (the source
line, i.e., line 1) is excited by a gap voltage source (see Fig.
28) [38]. The crosstalk current is dened as the current
induced on line 2 (the victim line, which is passive). At low
frequency the current on the two lines is well predicted by
standard transmission-line theory, which gives the follow-
ing expressions for the current on each strip
I
TLT
1
(z) =
1
4
1
Z
e
0
e
jk
e
z
z
1
Z
o
0
e
jk
o
z
z
_ _
(40)
I
TLT
2
(z) =
1
4
1
Z
e
0
e
jk
e
z
z
1
Z
o
0
e
jk
o
z
z
_ _
(41)
where Z
e
0
and Z
o
0
are the frequency-dependent even-mode
and odd-mode characteristic impedances and k
e
z
and k
o
z
are
the corresponding wavenumbers. However, simple trans-
mission-line theory fails to predict the effects of the con-
tinuous spectrum, and ignores all radiation effects. It will
be seen that the CS current can be predominant at high
frequency, and can thus be a source of undesirable spuri-
ous effects that can ruin the performance of microwave
circuitry involving neighboring printed-circuit lines.
4.1. Formulation for the Currents
The same concepts presented in Section 2 apply to the
present case, with some extension to account for the fact
that currents now exist on two lines. One important fea-
ture of the present structure is that the currents do not
show any symmetry about the center of either line, and
thus a multiple-basis function expansion is necessary in
practice to model these currents. Thus, the surface current
can be expanded, similarly to (24) and (25), as
J
(l)
z
(x; z) =
N
f
q =0
T
z
l;q
(x)I
z
l;q
(z) (42)
J
(l)
x
(x; z) =
N
f
p=1
T
x
l;p
(x)I
x
l;p
(z) (43)
where the subscript l =1, 2 is now added to denote the
strip conductor (the integers q and p are no longer even
and odd, respectively, as they were for the case of a single
strip).
However, with the aim of keeping the explanation of
the problem as simple as possible, only a single longitudi-
nal basis function will be used on each line in the following
explanation. This implies that the surface current on each
line is expanded as J
(1)
z
(x; z) =T
1
(x)I
1
(z) and
J
(2)
z
(x; z) =T
2
(x)I
2
(z) and thus the EFIE can be written as
E
(1)
z
[T
1
(x)I
1
(z)] E
(1)
z
[T
2
(x)I
2
(z)] =E
gap
z
(z) (44)
E
(2)
z
[T
1
(x)I
1
(z)] E
(2)
z
[T
2
(x)I
2
(z)] =0 (45)
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0 5 10 15
z/z
0
20 25 35 30
Total current
Bound mode
Bound mode+Leaky mode
Continuous spectrum
Figure 27. The same type of plot as in Fig. 26a but for an airgap
thickness of 0.353mm, which results in an almost a perfect de-
structive interference between the bound-mode and continuous-
spectrum currents at zE32l
0
.
1V
I
1
(z)
z
w
1
w
2
s
I
2
(z)
Figure 28. Top view of a pair of coupled microstrip lines. Line 1
is fed by a gap voltage source, causing a crosstalk current in line 2.
The Galerkin testing procedure combined with the appli-
cation of the inverse longitudinal Fourier transform leads
to the following system of equations
~
II
1
(k
z
)
_
w
1
T
1
(x)E
(1)
z
[T
1
(x)e
jk
z
z
] dx
~
II
2
(k
z
)
_
w1
T
1
(x)E
(1)
z
[T
2
(x)e
jk
z
z
] dx =
~
EE
gap
z
(k
z
)e
jk
z
z
(46)
~
II
1
(k
z
)
_
w
2
T
2
(x)E
(2)
z
[T
1
(x)e
jkzz
] dx
~
II
2
(k
z
)
_
w
2
T
2
(x)E
(2)
z
[T
2
(x)e
jkzz
] dx =0
(47)
which can be rewritten as
Z
11
(k
z
) Z
12
(k
z
)
Z
21
(k
z
) Z
22
(k
z
)
_ _
~
II
1
(k
z
)
~
II
2
(k
z
)
_ _
=
~
EE
gap
z
(k
z
)
0
_ _
(48)
where the Z
ij
(k
z
) coefcients (i, j =1, 2) have the following
form:
*
Space Domain:
Z
ij
(k
z
) =
_
w
i
_
w
j
T
i
(x)
~
GG
zz
(x x
/
; k
z
)T
j
(x
/
) dx
/
dx (49)
*
Spectral Domain:
Z
ij
(k
z
) =
1
2p
_
C
kx
~
TT
i
(k
x
)
~
GG
zz
(k
x
; k
z
)
~
TT
j
(k
x
)e
jk
x
s(1d
ij
)
dk
x
(50)
The form given in (49) will be used when the DCIT is used
with the corresponding MPIE in the space domain, and
expression (50) is used when the EFIE is solved using the
SDA approach.
Following the same rationale as in Section 2, the total
current on the lines is given by I
1
(z) =I
z
1;0
(z) and
I
2
(z) =I
z
2;0
(z), which are given in terms of their correspond-
ing longitudinal Fourier transforms as
I
l
(z) =
1
2p
_
C
kz
~
II
z
l;0
(k
z
)e
jkzz
dk
z
; l =1; 2 (51)
4.2. Results
The theory presented above (using multiple basis func-
tions) has been implemented in a computer code to study
the crosstalk current in line 2, I
2
(z), for a pair of coupled
microstrip lines when line 1 is excited by a 1-V gap voltage
source.
Figure 29 shows the crosstalk current for two micro-
strip lines at various frequencies (low, medium, and high
frequencies) and a wide separation between the lines
(s/h=10). The crosstalk current is plotted versus distance
z from the origin (the source is at z =0 on line 1). Both the
total current (TC) numerically obtained from (51) and the
transmission-line theory (TLT) current given by (41) are
shown. The curves show that, at the low frequency of
1 GHz (h/l
0
E0.003), transmission-line theory predicts
very accurately the crosstalk current. At 20 GHz (h/
l
0
E0.065) there is overall agreement, but the exact cross-
talk current shows a noticeable oscillation, which is due to
the presence of the CS current. At 40GHz (h/l
0
E0.13) the
CS current has become strong enough that there is no
agreement at all between the exact and the TLT currents.
It is interesting to note that at low frequency, for a large
line separation, the crosstalk current exhibits an almost
perfectly linear growth with distance z. This is explainable
from Eq. (41), which may be rewritten as
I
TLT
2
(z) =
1
4
1
Z
e
0
1
Z
o
0
_ _
e
jk
e
z
z
j
2Z
o
0
e
jk
a
z
z
sin(Dk
z
z=2)
(52)
where k
a
z
=(k
e
z
k
o
z
)=2 is the average of the two bound-
mode wavenumbers and Dk
z
=k
e
z
k
o
z
is their difference.
As the line separation increases, the even- and odd-mode
characteristic impedances and wavenumbers approach
each other, making the rst term in Eq. (52) negligible
and the second term approximately linear.
To explore the nature of the spurious behavior of I
2
(z) at
high frequency (40 GHz), Fig. 30 shows the decomposition
of this current in terms of its constituent parts, the BM
and the CS currents. The TLT current predicted by
Eq. (52) is also shown for comparison. It is seen that the
CS current is significantly stronger than the BM current,
conrming that the CS current is responsible for the spu-
rious effects. It is also interesting to note that the TLT
current predicts fairly accurately the actual BM current
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
20 18 16 14 12 10
z/z
0
8 6 4 2 0
1 GHz
20 GHz
40 GHz
TLT:1GHz
TLT:20GHz
TLT:40GHZ
Figure 29. Crosstalk current I
2
(z) versus z/l
0
for e
r
=2.2, s/h=
10.0, w
1
=w
2
=h=1.0mm. Both the total current and the trans-
mission-line theory (TLT) currents are plotted for three different
frequencies.
on the line. Thus, transmission-line theory predicts accu-
rately the amplitude of the BM currents on the line, which
in the exact theory comes from the residues at the two BM
poles in the complex k
z
plane. Transmission-line theory
does not account for the CS current, however, so the TLT
current is far from the actual current on the line.
It is also interesting to note from Fig. 29 that for low to
moderate frequencies, the crosstalk current decreases as
the frequency increases. This is because the even- and
odd-mode wavenumbers become more nearly equal as the
frequency increases. As seen from Eq. (52), this results in
the crosstalk current I
2
(z) becoming smaller. However,
when the frequency becomes very high, the crosstalk cur-
rent increases with frequency, due to the increase of the
CS current. This is illustrated by Fig. 31, which shows
that at 80 GHz the crosstalk current has significantly in-
creased from 40 GHz.
For large line separations, the CS current strongly
dominates the crosstalk current at high frequencies.
This is illustrated by Fig. 32, which shows that at
80 GHz, the total crosstalk current and the CS component
of the crosstalk current are essentially indistinguishable.
Physically, this is because for large line separation and
high frequency, the crosstalk current is due mainly to ra-
diation from the source line into the TM
0
parallel-plate
mode, as opposed to quasistatic coupling. Radiation from
the source line mainly induces a CS current on the victim
line, instead of a bound mode, since the bound modes have
wavenumbers that are larger than that of the TM
0
parallel-
plate mode, and hence cannot couple to the TM
0
parallel-
plate radiation.
The behavior of the high-frequency crosstalk current
for various line separations is shown in Fig. 33. For a
small line separation (s/h=2), the crosstalk current is well
accounted for by TLT model, but this good agreement
worsens as the line separation increases. This fact can be
adduced to the predominant quasistatic nature of the
crosstalk coupling for small separation between the lines,
which is accounted for by the TLT model. As the frequency
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
0.35
0.3
0.25
0.2
0.15
0.1
0.05
0
20 18 16 14 12 10
z/z
0
8 6 4 2 0
Freq=40GHz
TC
BM
CS
TLT
Figure 30. Total crosstalk current I
2
(z) and its constituent parts
versus z/l
0
for e
r
=2.2, s/h=10.0, w
1
=w
2
=h=1.0mm at 40GHz.
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
) 0.7
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
1
0.9
0.8
0.6
20 18 16 14 12 10
z/z
0
8 6 4 2 0
40 GHz
80 GHz
Figure 31. Comparison of the total crosstalk current I
2
(z) versus
z/l
0
for e
r
=2.2, s/h=10.0, w
1
=w
2
=h=1.0mm at 40 and 80GHz.
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
) 0.7
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
1
0.9
0.8
0.6
20 18 16 14 12 10
z/z
0
8 6 4 2 0
TC
BM
CS
Figure 32. Total crosstalk current I
2
(z) and its constituent parts
versus z/l
0
for e
r
=2.2, s/h=10.0, w
1
=w
2
=h=1.0mm at 80GHz.
The TC and CS curves are indistinguishable, while the BM curve
is essentially zero.
C
r
o
s
s
t
a
l
k

c
u
r
r
e
n
t

a
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
3.5
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
5
4.5
4
3
20 18 16 14 12 10
z/z
0
8 6 4 2 0
Freq=40GHz
s/h=2.0
s/h=5.0
s/h=10.0
TLT: s/h=2.0
TLT: s/h=5.0
TLT: s/h=10.0
Figure 33. Total crosstalk and transmission-line theory (TLT)
currents versus z/l
0
for various line separations: s/h=2, 5, 10;
e
r
=2.2, w
1
=w
2
=h=1.0 mm, frequency=40GHz.
increases, the TLT model loses accuracy as the CS current
becomes stronger. It is clear by comparing Figs. 29 and 33
that as the line separation increases, the frequency at
which the CS current becomes appreciable decreases.
Hence, simple transmission-line theory loses accuracy at
lower frequencies when the line separation is larger.
5. CROSSTALK FIELDS
In this section, the elds radiated by the currents on the
strip conductor of a printed-circuit transmission line are
examined, to see how crosstalk elds may be produced,
especially at high frequency, due to the radiation from the
currents that are induced on the strip conductor excited by
a gap voltage source [39,40].
The structure that is examined is the covered micro-
strip structure of Fig. 1b. The currents on this structure
that are produced by a gap voltage source have already
been examined in some detail in Section 3.2, where it was
shown that the total current consists of a bound-mode
(BM) transmission-line mode together with a continuous-
spectrum (CS) current. The CS current consists of a phys-
ical leaky-mode (LM) current, when such a mode exists,
together with a TM
0
residual-wave (RW) current. Hence,
there are a maximum of three different types of currents
on the line, the BM, LM, and RW currents.
The BMcurrent is normally regarded as a nonradiating
type of current, since the elds are bound to the guiding
structure. Indeed, for such a mode propagating on an in-
nite line, there would be no radiation and no power loss
(assuming lossless conductors and dielectric). However,
the 1-V gap voltage source at z =0 is a discontinuity, and
radiation in general occurs from discontinuities. In par-
ticular, the current in Eq. (2) has a slope discontinuity (a
discontinuity in the derivative) at z =0. Because of this
discontinuity, the BM current will produce a radiation
eld, with radiation occurring into the TM
0
parallel-plate
substrate mode. As shown in the results below, the level of
this radiation increases with frequency.
The RW current increases with frequency, as demon-
strated in Section 3.2. This current is a rather complicated
function of distance z from the source, although asymp-
totically it propagates with a wavenumber of k
TM
0
, as
shown in Eq. (4). For this reason, the radiation from this
current is somewhat endre directed, concentrated more
toward the direction of the strip axis, as will be shown in
the results below. However, the radiation is somewhat dif-
fuse, since the current is actually composed of a continu-
ous spectrum of wavenumbers.
When a physical LM current exists on the line, the ra-
diation from this current is typically directive, in the form
of a beam, since the LM current has a single wavenumber
b that is less than k
TM
0
. The LM current may thus be re-
sponsible for significant crosstalk elds in the direction of
this beam. This will be demonstrated in the results pre-
sented below.
5.1. Calculation of Crosstalk Fields
To calculate the crosstalk eld, it is rst assumed that only
radiation into the TM
0
parallel-plate mode is significant.
All of the other higher-order parallel-plate modes are as-
sumed to be sufciently far below cutoff that these elds
decay very rapidly away from the strip current, and hence
are negligible at any significant distance away from the
strip (in practice, more than a half-wavelength or so).
Hence, the crosstalk eld is assumed to be the eld of the
TM
0
parallel-plate mode that is produced by the current
on the strip conductor. To calculate this eld, the eld of a
unit amplitude innitesimal electric dipole in the z direc-
tion on top of the substrate at x =0, z =0, y =h is consi-
dered. The TM
0
eld from the dipole has the following
form in cylindrical (r, f, y) coordinates:
E
y
(r; f; y) =Af (y)H
(2)
1
(k
TM
0
r) cos f (53)
where, for 0oyoh, we obtain
f (y) = cos(k
y1
y) (54)
with
k
y1
=(k
2
1
k
2
TM
0
)
1=2
(55)
where k
1
is the wavenumber in the substrate. The con-
stant A can be determined by spectral-domain techniques,
but the value is not important here.
The eld from the strip current is found by integrating
over the strip current, using the above mentioned dipole
eld as a Greens function. Assuming the line width to be
small relative to a wavelength, the integral has the fol-
lowing form
E
y
(x; y; z) =Af (y)
_
o
o
I(z
/
)H
(2)
1
(k
TM
0
r
/
) cos f
/
dz
/
(56)
where
r
/
=
x
2
(z z
/
)
2
_
(57)
tan(f
/
) =
x
z z
/
(58)
Integrating across the substrate height, the voltage drop
between the strip and the ground plane at any point is
V
h
(x; z) = Ah sinc(k
y1
h)
_
o
o
I(z
/
)H
(2)
1
(k
TM
0
r
/
) cos f
/
dz
/
(59)
The integral can be accelerated by using a technique such
as the Shanks transform [41].
5.2. Results
All the cases presented in this section are for a covered
microstrip with e
r
=2.2 and w=h, with a cover height
h
c
=h. The dispersion plot for this structure is shown in
Fig. 34. This gure shows three distinct regions of behavior.
In the rst region, h/l
0
o0.021, there is no leaky mode; only
a pair of nonphysical improper real modes exist, in addition
to the bound mode. In the region 0.021oh/l
0
o0.052, a
leaky mode exists, but it is nonphysical (since the wave-
number of the leaky mode is larger than that of the TM
0
parallel-plate mode). In the region h/l
0
40.052 the leaky
mode is physical. Results will be shown for each region to
illustrate how the eld surrounding the strip behaves.
The rst case is that for h/l
0
=0.005. For this low-fre-
quency case, the operating point is well inside the non-
physical spectral-gap region in the dispersion plot of
Fig. 34. As a result of the low frequency, the continuous-
spectrum current is very small, as shown in Fig. 35. The
oscillations in the total current due to the interference
between the BM and CS currents are apparent, although
they are small in amplitude, since the CS current is quite
small compared with the BM current. Figure 36 shows a
plot of the eld surrounding the strip for this case. The
eld is fairly diffuse away from the strip, with noticeable
oscillations close to the strip as the observation distance z
increases. This oscillation is due to an interference be-
tween two components that make up the overall eld pro-
duced by the BM current. One component is the eld due
to a bound mode propagating on an innite line. This eld
propagates in the z direction with the wavenumber of the
bound mode, and decays exponentially away from the line.
The second component is a radiation type of eld that
propagates radially with a wavenumber k
TM
0
and decays
as 1=

r
_
, and arises because of the slope discontinuity of
the BM current at the origin.
Figure 37 shows the current components at a higher
frequency of h/l
0
=0.04. At this frequency the leaky mode
exists, but is nonphysical. Figure 37 shows that at this
higher frequency the CS current has become significant,
because of the strong RW current that now exists. Figure 38
shows that the eld surrounding the strip has begun to
become more directive in shape, although the eld is still
somewhat diffuse.
Figure 39 shows the current components at a still high-
er frequency of h/l
0
=0.08. At this frequency the leaky
mode exists and is physical. Because of the physical LM
current, the CS current is now quite strong. Figure 40
N
o
r
m
a
l
i
z
e
d

p
h
a
s
e

c
o
n
s
t
a
n
t
1.35
1.4
1.3
1.25
1.2
1.15
1.1
0.09 0.08 0.07 0.06 0.05 0.04 0.03 0.02 0 0.01
h/z
0
Bound mode
TM0 mode
Leaky mode
Improper real modes
Figure 34. Dispersion plot showing the normalized phase
constants (b/k
0
) versus normalized frequency (h/l
0
) for a covered
microstrip (h
c
=h, w=h, e
r
=2.2)
C
u
r
r
e
n
t

m
a
g
n
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0 1 2 3
z/z
0
4 5 8 7 6
Total
Bound mode
Continuous spectrum
Figure 35. Strip current for a covered microstrip at a normalized
frequency of h/l
0
=0.005 (h
c
=h, w=h, e
r
=2.2).
x
/
z
0
z/z
0
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
0 5 10 15 20
3.5
3
4
4.5
5
0.033+
0.03 to 0.033
0.027 to 0.03
0.024 to 0.027
0.021 to 0.024
0.018 to 0.021
0.015 to 0.018
0.012 to 0.015
0.009 to 0.012
0.006 to 0.009
0.003 to 0.006
0 to 0.003
Figure 36. Normalized substrate voltage for the covered micro-
strip of Fig. 35. (This gure is available in full color at http://
shows that the eld surrounding the strip has begun to
assume a beamlike shape, due to the radiation of the LM
current. The overall level of the eld is also higher. Clear-
ly, significant crosstalk could occur with circuit compo-
nents that are placed within the beamlike region of strong
leakage elds. The angle of leakage of the leaky mode,
measured from the strip axis, is given approximately (for
small attenuation constants) as
f
0
= cos
1
b
k
TM
0
_ _
(60)
C
u
r
r
e
n
t

m
a
g
n
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0 1 2 3
z/z
0
4 5 8 7 6
Total
Bound mode
Continuous spectrum
frequency of h/l
0
=0.04 (h
c
=h, w=h, e
r
=2.2).
x
/
z
0
z/z
0
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
0 5 10 15 20
3.5
3
4
4.5
5
0.033+
0.03 to 0.033
0.027 to 0.03
0.024 to 0.027
0.021 to 0.024
0.018 to 0.021
0.015 to 0.018
0.012 to 0.015
0.009 to 0.012
0.006 to 0.009
0.003 to 0.006
0 to 0.003
C
u
r
r
e
n
t

m
a
g
n
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
A
)
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0 1 2 3
z/z
0
4 5 8 7 6
Total
Bound mode
Leaky mode
Residual wave
frequency of h/l
0
=0.08 (h
c
=h, w=h, e
r
=2.2).
x
/
z
0
z/z
0
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
0 5 10 15 20
3.5
3
4
4.5
5
0.044+
0.04 to 0.044
0.036 to 0.04
0.032 to 0.036
0.028 to 0.032
0.024 to 0.028
0.02 to 0.024
0.016 to 0.02
0.012 to 0.016
0.008 to 0.012
0.004 to 0.008
0 to 0.004
where b is the phase constant of the leaky mode. This
equation actually predicts the leakage angle for a leaky
mode existing by itself on an innite line, with a small
attenuation constant. The predicted leakage angle from
this equation is B13.51, whereas the actual beam angle in
Fig. 40 is B181. The discrepancy is caused by several fac-
tors: (1) the attenuation constant of the leaky mode is not
zero, as is assumed in Eq. (60); and (2) the total eld con-
sists of the BM and RW elds in addition to the LM eld.
Finally, the direction of maximum radiation for the eld
radiated by the LM current of Eq. (3) is not the same as
the direction of leakage for a leaky mode on an innite
line, since the eld radiated by the LM current of Eq. (3)
consists of a source discontinuity radiation term due to the
slope discontinuity of the current at the origin.
6. CONCLUSIONS
This article has examined the nature of the current and
elds excited by gap voltage source on an innite printed-
circuit transmission line, in order to ascertain the nature
of the current and to show what types of spurious effects
may be produced at high frequency. Three particular
structures have been examined: microstrip, covered
microstrip, and stripline with an airgap above the strip
conductor.
A semianalytical method for determining the strip cur-
rent has been used, based on a Fourier transform of the
current in the longitudinal (z) direction. The strip current
is thus expressed as an inverse Fourier transform integral
in the complex longitudinal wavenumber (k
z
) plane. This
method provides an accurate calculation of the strip cur-
rent, as well as physical insight into the nature of the
current on the strip. In particular, deforming the original
path of integration in the k
z
plane allows for a convenient
decomposition of the total strip current into a sum of con-
stituent parts.
It was shown that the total current consists of a bound-
mode (BM) current together with a continuous-spectrum
(CS) current. The BM current corresponds to the usual
transmission-line mode, whose elds are bound to the
strip region, decaying away from the strip in the trans-
verse (x) direction. The amplitude of the BM current is
accurately calculated at any frequency by taking the res-
idue in the k
z
plane at the BM pole. The amplitude of the
BM current obtained this way is accurate even for high
frequencies, where the definition of the characteristic im-
pedance becomes ambiguous. The CS current is, generally
speaking, a high-frequency radiation type of current
whose existence cannot be predicted by simple transmis-
sion-line theory.
The CS current consists of two types of current. The
rst is a set of any physical leaky-mode currents. A phys-
ical leaky mode is dened here as one that satises a
path consistency condition, meaning that the nature of
the leakage (as determined by the path of integration in
the transverse wavenumber (k
x
) plane used to calculate
the wavenumber of the leaky mode) is consistent with the
phase constant of the leaky mode. For open structures
such as microstrip, there are two types of leaky modes that
may in principle be physical. One type has leakage into
only the TM
0
surface-wave mode of the grounded sub-
strate (assuming here that only the TM
0
mode is above
cutoff). This type of leaky mode is physical when the phase
constant of the leaky mode is less than the wavenumber of
the TM
0
surface-wave mode, and greater than the wave-
number of free space. The second type of leaky mode,
which can exist on open (uncovered) structures, has leak-
age into both the TM
0
surface-wave mode and also into
space. This type of leaky mode is physical when the phase
constant of the leaky mode is less than the wavenumber k
0
of free space. For the cases presented here, only the rst
type of physical leaky mode has been found to exist for the
parameters used in the results. For closed structures
(meaning that a ground plane exists both above and be-
low the structure) such as covered microstrip, only the
rst type of leaky mode can exist.
The second type of current that makes up the CS cur-
rent is the residua1-wave (RW) current. This current
physically represents the current that is left over when
the physical leaky-mode currents are removed from the
CS current. For open structures such as microstrip, the
RW current consists of a sum of two different RW currents:
a TM
0
RW current and a k
0
RW current. Mathematically,
these currents arise from the corresponding branchpoints
in the complex k
z
plane, at the locations of the TM
0
sur-
face-wave wavenumber and the k
0
wavenumber, respec-
tively. Although there is no closed-form expression
available for these currents, an asymptotic analysis re-
veals how they behave for large distances z from the
source. The TM
0
RW current propagates with the wave-
number of the TM
0
surface-wave mode, and decays with
distance along the strip as z
3/2
. The k
0
RW current prop-
agates with the wavenumber k
0
of free space, and decays
with distance along the strip as z
2
. For a closed structure
such as covered microstrip, only the TM
0
RW current
exists.
Hence, for an open structure such as microstrip, the
strip current produced by the gap voltage source consists
of a sum of ve possible current waves:
1. The bound-mode (transmission-line mode) current
2. A physical leaky mode (if any) that leaks into the
TM
0
substrate mode
3. A physical leaky mode (if any) that leaks into both
the TM
0
substrate mode and into space
4. A TM
0
residual-wave current, which asymptotically
propagates with the wavenumber of the TM
0
mode
and decays as z
3/2
5. A k
0
residual-wave current, which asymptotically
propagates with the wavenumber of free space and
decays as z
2
For a closed structure such as covered microstrip, only
currents 1, 2, and 4 exist.
For microstrip, only the desired BM current exists at
low frequency. However, as the frequency increases, the
CS current becomes increasingly important. For mode-
rate frequencies, the CS increases in amplitude as the
frequency increases because the RW current increases in
amplitude with frequency. For high frequencies a leaky
mode (having leakage into the TM
0
surface-wave mode)
becomes physical, and the CS current becomes very sig-
nificant above this frequency. This frequency occurs
roughly when the substrate is a tenth of a wavelength
thick electrically in the dielectric. As the frequency in-
creases, a significant oscillation is observed in a plot of the
strip current versus the distance z from the source. This
oscillation is due to an interference between the desired
BM current and the CS current.
For covered microstrip, the oscillations in the strip cur-
rent also increase with frequency, since the CS current
increases with frequency. However, the effect of the top
cover also significantly increases the magnitude of the
spurious oscillation. This is due to two effects: (1) as the
top cover is lowered toward the microstrip line, the am-
plitude of the RW current increases; and (2) even more
importantly, as the top cover is lowered, the frequency at
which a physical leaky mode exists is lowered. In fact, for
a sufciently small cover height, a physical leaky mode
exists at all frequencies. Therefore, even at low frequen-
cies, a significant oscillation in the strip current may be
observed when the cover height is sufciently small, due to
the leaky mode. For a certain value of the cover height, a
complete destructive interference will occur between the
leaky mode and the bound mode at some distance from the
source; that is, the two currents will have an equal am-
plitude and a 1801 phase difference at some distance z
from the source. At this point on the line the total current
will essentially have a complete null.
Homogeneous stripline supports only the desired TEM
mode of propagation. However, during manufacture, an
airgap may be inadvertently introduced above the strip
conductor. It has been known for many years that such an
airgap may lead to poor performance, although the rea-
sons were, perhaps, not completely clear. It was shown
here that the presence of the airgap causes the TEM strip-
line mode to become a leaky mode. For a small airgap the
leaky mode still resembles the usual TEM stripline mode,
but the mode now has a complex wavenumber due to
leakage loss (leakage into the TM
0
parallel-plate mode of
the background airgap structure). This results in power
loss as the mode propagates, which is in addition to any
attenuation due to conductor or dielectric loss. In addition
to the quasi-TEM leaky mode, there is also a bound mode
that exists on the structure with a small airgap, but the
bound mode has a eld conguration that resembles that
of a parallel-plate mode, and is thus only weakly excited
by the gap source (or by a conventional stripline connector,
in practice). The bound mode does not attenuate with dis-
tance from the source, however, and thus a significant in-
terference may occur between the quasi-TEM leaky mode
and the bound mode at some distance from the source.
This results in a spurious dip in the observed transmission
response (S
12
) of the transmission line at a particular dis-
tance from the source (or at a particular frequency, if the
distance is xed).
The analysis and results were extended to the case of
two coupled microstrip lines, where a gap voltage source
was placed on one line (the source line) and the current
that was produced on the second line (the victim line) was
examined. It was concluded that at low frequency, an
even/odd-mode transmission-line analysis is sufcient to
determine the crosstalk current on the victim line. Inter-
estingly, for larger line separation, and low frequency, the
crosstalk current displays an almost linear behavior,
growing linearly with distance z on the line away from
the origin (where the gap source is placed on the source
line). This is explainable from simple transmission-line
theory. At higher frequency, the CS current becomes im-
portant, and simple transmission-line theory is no longer
adequate to predict the crosstalk current. For large line
separation and higher frequencies, the main component of
the crosstalk current is in fact the CS current.
Finally, the eld surrounding a printed-circuit trans-
mission line that is excited by a gap voltage source was
examined, and results were shown for the case of a cov-
ered microstrip line (with a moderate cover height). The
nature of this eld is important for understanding the
crosstalk that may occur with other circuit components
placed in the package near the printed-circuit transmis-
sion line. At low frequency, it is mainly the bound mode
that is excited on the line. However, because of the dis-
continuity in the derivative of the current (slope disconti-
nuity) at the source location, there is radiation from the
BM current. The total eld from the BM current, when
plotted along the z direction parallel to the strip, is an
oscillatory one. This is because the eld from the BM cur-
rent physically consists of two parts: (1) the eld of the
bound mode itself, which decays exponentially away from
the strip, and (2) the radiation from the slope discontinu-
ity in the BM current at the origin.
As the frequency increases, the RW current becomes
appreciable, and the crosstalk elds become stronger and
extend out to distances farther from the line. The cross-
talk eld is fairly diffuse, however. As the frequency in-
creases past the point where a leaky mode becomes
physical, the crosstalk eld begins to assume a beamlike
shape, due to radiation from the leaky-mode current,
which is directed at a particular leakage angle. At these
higher frequencies, crosstalk may be especially severe for
circuit components that are in the direction of the leakage
radiation.
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LEAKY-WAVE ANTENNAS
ALESSANDRO GALLI
FABRIZIO FREZZA
PAOLO LAMPARIELLO
La Sapienza University of
Rome
Italy
1. FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTS
1.1. Definition
According to the IEEE Standard 145-1993, a leaky-wave
antenna (LWA) is an antenna that couples power in small
increments per unit length either continuously or dis-
cretely, from a traveling wave structure to free space.
The basic behavior of LWAs can efciently be described
by means of a particular type of wave, that is the leaky
wave, which can propagate in open waveguiding struc-
tures and describes a gradual loss of power towards the
external environment (leakage).
1.2. Basic Radiation Features
LWAs belong to the class of traveling-wave antennas for
which the illumination is produced by a wave that prop-
agates along a guiding structure [13]. If compared with
the wavelength, a single LWA typically is long in the prop-
agation direction (z), while its cross section usually is of
the order of the wavelength (see, as reference, the rst two
examples in Fig. 1). Therefore, a LWA radiates along its
length and is generally excited from one input of an open
guiding structure by a traveling wave, which propagates
mainly in a longitudinal direction (e.g., z) and is atten-
uated due to the power leakage toward the external (air)
region, thus leaving a negligible eld at the termination of
the line. In a harmonic regime [assuming an exp(jot) time
dependence], the longitudinal behavior of such a wave can
be characterized by a complex propagation constant of the
type k
z
=b
z
ja
z
[35], where b
z
is the phase constant and
a
z
is the attenuation constant of the leaky wave (when only
power loss due to radiation is taken into account, a
z
is also
termed leakage constant). As discussed later, the knowl-
edge of the complex propagation constant of this leaky
wave allows for a straightforward description of the main
radiation features of LWAs.
Usually the radiation pattern of a single LWA excited at
one end has a typical fan shape; in the elevation (or zenith)
plane it presents a narrow beam scannable by varying the
frequency, while in the cross (or azimuth) plane usually it
presents a wider beam due to a smaller transverse aper-
ture. Multidirectional excitation is also possible, as can
occur in planar dielectric structures excited by local sourc-
es (dipoles or slots) able to produce conical beams.
In general, beamshaping is achievable by means of
suitable longitudinal variations of the structure (and of
the consequent equivalent aperture distribution); the
proper modulation of geometric parameters (tapering) al-
lows for exible control of the radiation pattern. In some
cases, in order to obtain a particular beam shaping or a
physical matching with mounting curved surfaces, LWAs
can be designed with certain amounts of curvature along
their lengths [6]. Broadbeam LWAs have also been pro-
posed using straight lengths with suitable longitudinal
modulation of both phase and leakage constants [7].
For ordinary LWAs the frequency-dependent scanning
properties in the elevation plane are related to the kind of
the waveguiding structure employed, which can be clas-
sied as either of uniform (Fig. 1a) or of periodic type
(Fig. 1b) [1,2]. In LWAs derived by waveguides that are
longitudinally uniform, the structure maintains a xed
transverse geometry (with possible continuous smooth
modulation of the shape in the z direction); this type of
radiators typically allows for angular scanning in one
quadrant, from around broadside toward one endre
(i.e., the forward one, concordant with the wave propa-
gation direction). In LWAs derived by waveguides that are
longitudinally periodic, the structure along z is periodi-
cally loaded with suitable modications or discontinuities,
at intervals that are usually short with respect to the
wavelength; this type of radiator allows for a wider angu-
lar scanning, in both the forward and backward quad-
rants. However, for different reasons, limitations in such
scanning ranges generally exist for both the types of struc-
tures. A scan range in both quadrants may also be accom-
plished by properly using nonreciprocal anisotropic
media.
When a pencil beam is desired with possible two-
dimensional (2D) scanning, both in elevation and cross
planes, a linear phased array of juxtaposed LWAs may be
employed, capable to furnish a wider equivalent aperture
also in the transverse direction [8,9] (see Fig. 1c). LWA
arrays are in general constituted by a linear conguration
E
Array of
leaky-wave
line sources
Load
Feed system with
phase shifters
c
r

(a) (b)
(c)
Figure 1. Basic structures of leaky-wave antennas (LWAs):
(a) uniform LWAsgeometry derivable by a partially open me-
tallic rectangular waveguide; (b) periodic LWAsgeometry deriv-
able by a strip-loaded dielectric-rod waveguide; (c) LWA arrays
a printed topology based on microstrip.
2294 LEAKY-WAVE ANTENNAS
of sources (i.e., one-dimensional elements), instead of pla-
nar ones of standard arrays (i.e., two-dimensional ele-
ments). For such LWA arrays the pointed-beam scanning
is achievable by varying both the frequency for the eleva-
tion plane and the usual phase shift between elements
for the cross plane.
1.3. Applications
Since LWAs are derived by partially open waveguides,
they present a number of distinctive features as radiators,
including (1) capability of designing a wide variety of ap-
erture distributions and consequent exibility for beam
shaping through tapering; (2) possible use as wideband
radiators that allow for large angular scanning by varying
frequency instead of using mechanical or electronic
means; (3) achievement of very narrow beams, often
with good polarization purity; (4) simplicity of feeding
and economy for 2D scannable pencil-beam arrays, due
to the reduced number of phase shifters; (5) handling of
high-power amounts at microwaves, particularly for struc-
tures derived by metallic waveguides; (6) easy integration
of planar LWAs with microwave integrated circuit (MIC)
technology; (7) reduction of some bulk problems, due to
usual small proles in the cross sections; and good phys-
ical matching with unconventional mounting geometries.
LWAs are used mainly for microwaves and millimeter
waves. The fundamental studies were presented during
the 1940s and 1950s, basically for aerospace control ap-
plications; since then, a wide number of different solutions
for LWAs have been proposed in connection with changing
requirements and constraints. Also the applicability of
this type of antennas has been widened, involving various
aspects of monitoring, remote sensing, wireless local area
network (WLAN) communications, and so forth.
2. OPERATION PRINCIPLES
2.1. Leaky Waves in Open Structures
It is known that, in order to describe radiation of a source
from an open waveguiding structure, the evaluation of the
eld through a spectral representation (i.e., including a
sum of a nite number of guided modes and an integral
contribution of the continuous spectrum) can be very dif-
cult and cumbersome to quantify in many practical cir-
cumstances. In well-designed LWAs the radiation eld can
be evaluated accurately in much a simpler fashion by con-
sidering the contribution due to the presence of just one
mode of complex type, that is a leaky wave of the open
guide.
In general, the characteristic dispersion equation for a
waveguide (whose solution furnishes the propagation con-
stants k
z
of the modes as a function of geometry and fre-
quency) presents discrete eigenvalues, which in open
waveguides can also assume complex values, thus giving
rise to solutions of the type k
z
=b
z
ja
z
. It is seen that
these complex solutions are in general nonspectral, that is
the relevant modal elds violate the radiation condition
(they attenuate along the propagation direction but expo-
nentially increase in a transverse direction away from the
structure). Actually, when properly excited by a source at
a nite section, such a complex wave assumes its physical
validity within an angular sector close to the equivalent
aperture of the open guiding structure, and the relevant
eld distribution is able to furnish a fundamental contri-
bution to the evaluation of the near eld. Since the far
eld is achieved by a simple Fourier transform of the eld
on the aperture, a leaky wave can denitively furnish a
highly convergent and efcient quantication of the radi-
ation of the open structure, as an advantageous alternative
to a continuous spectrum evaluation.
When a leaky wave exists and can also be efciently
excited by a source in a structure based on an open wave-
guide, it therefore can describe simply but accurately the
radiation phenomena of the structure, which is therefore
termed a leaky-wave antenna.
2.2. Phase and Leakage Constants
Evaluation of the complex eigensolutions for open wave-
guides depends on the physical parameters involved (fre-
quency and geometry) and is generally achievable with
numerical methods. Among them, the transverse reso-
nance technique [10] is one of the most used approaches
for either rigorous or approximate evaluations, according
to the antenna topology. When separation of variables
does not strictly hold, other numerical methods can any-
way be employed to accurately determine the complex
eigensolutions of the involved open waveguides. The most
appropriate choice depends on several factors related to
the computational features of the methods, the geometry
of the open-type structures, and other variables. Among
the various possibilities, integral equation techniques
(such as boundary element method, or spectral-domain
approaches for planar structures) are well suited to cal-
culate complex eigensolutions also for involved topologies.
A typical behavior of the real and imaginary parts of
the longitudinal wavenumber k
z
of a leaky wave supported
by an open guide is illustrated in Fig. 2, specifically with
respect to the dispersion curves of the normalized param-
eters b
z
/k
0
(Fig. 2a) and a
z
/k
0
(Fig. 2b) versus frequency f
(where k
0
is the free-space wavenumber). Radiation of LW
structures can occur approximately inside the frequency
range where the wave becomes fast (b
z
/k
0
o1), and power
can therefore leak out from the guiding structure toward
the outside air region in the typical form of an inhomoge-
neous plane wave [4,5]. The valid frequency range for ef-
fective LWA applications is actually where, as the
frequency decreases, b
z
/k
0
diminishes monotonically
from unity toward rather low values; in this region, to
have an efcient directive beam, a
z
/k
0
should assume
rather limited values (e.g., typically a
z
/k
0
varies from
about 10
1
to 10
3
, as will be discussed further). As the
frequency decreases further, a sudden rise of a
z
/k
0
can
generally be found, which describes the predominance of
reactive phenomena instead of radiative ones, while b
z
/k
0
can present a at zone with approximately constant low
values before showing a further steep rise as frequency
goes to zero: in these ranges, radiative effects can no long-
er be represented by the leaky wave and the structures
usually cannot work well as antennas.
LEAKY-WAVE ANTENNAS 2295
It is worth remembering that in planar structures that
are also transversely open, a different type of leakage can
occur, too, associated with the propagation of complex
waves that carry away power from a source in the later-
al region inside the substrate (surface waves), instead of
toward the upper-air region (space waves); the waves in
the substrate do not give useful contributions to a LWA
far-eld radiation but describe power that leaks out in the
stratied structures and accounts for typical interference
and crosstalk effects in planar circuits [8,11].
2.3. Behavior of a Leaky-Wave Antenna
As stated above, LWAs are described by an inhomogeneous
fast wave, which propagates on an equivalent aperture
losing power towards free-space with a leakage amount
that is usually rather limited for a sufciently directive
beam. The simplest LWA geometry for this purpose is
derivable by a closed metallic waveguide in which a suit-
able small aperture is introduced longitudinally in order
to calculate a continuous power loss along its length, as
shown in Fig. 3a for a rectangular guide with a slit cut on a
sidewall. This structure, besides having a historical im-
portance as the rst proposed LWA in 1940 [13], can be
taken as a reference structure for explaining the basic be-
havior of LWAs in terms of a waveguide description.
In fact, in this structure a leaky wave can be considered
as excited by a standard incident mode for the closed rect-
angular waveguide, that is, the dominant TE
10
, which
travels in the z direction with a known phase constant
b
0z
for a xed choice of the physical parameters (geometry
and frequency). For a sufciently small geometric pertur-
bation due to the slit, the phase constant is changed just
slightly to a value represented by b
z
, and a low leakage
rate a
z
also originates; as mentioned, this accounts for the
longitudinal attenuation due to the wave that is no longer
conned and ows also in the outside region. The propa-
gating eld inside the waveguide and in the proximity of
its aperture is therefore described by the complex longi-
tudinal wavenumber k
z
=b
z
ja
z
, whose specific quanti-
cation depends on the physical parameters of the
structure.
In this case the leakage phenomenon is assumed along
z (b
z
40 and a
z
40), and by supposing that the vertical
eld variations are almost negligible (k
y
D0), it is easily
seen that, from the general separation condition for wave-
guides (k
2
0
=o
2
m
0
e
0
=k
2
t
k
2
z
k
2
x
k
2
z
), the horizontal
wavenumber is also complex
k
x
=b
x
ja
x
; (1)
with b
x
40 and a
x
o0, since b
x
a
x
= b
z
a
z
results. There-
fore a plane wave of inhomogeneous type exists, having a
complex propagation vector k of the type
k=b ja
b =b
x
x
0
b
z
z
0
a=a
x
x
0
a
z
z
0
(2)
with the phase vector b directed at an angle that describes
the outgoing of power from the guide to the external, and
the attenuation (leakage) vector a that is perpendicular to
b, and represents attenuation along z and amplication
along x. Consequently, the eld has a spatial dependence
of the type
exp[j(b
x
x b
z
z)] exp[[a
x
[x a
z
z] (3)
Therefore, this plane wave travels at an angle
y = sin
1
(b
z
=[b[) with respect to broadside carrying out
power, and its amplitude is transversely increasing as ex-
pected in a leaky wave. It should be noted that the point-
ing direction angle y of the leaky wave is usually
expressed under the approximate form y sin
1
(b
z
=k
0
),
since in general the leakage constant is numerically neg-
ligible with respect to the phase constant. The nature of
the propagation vector is sketched in Fig. 3b, while the
Radiation range
2
1.5
0.5
1
0
2 0 4 6 8 10 12 14
[
z

/
k
0
EH
1
EH
0
f (GHz)
30
25
20
15
10
15
0
5
2 0 4 6 8 10 12 14
:
z

/
k
0
EH
1
f (GHz)
(a)
(b)
Figure 2. Typical dispersion behavior of the leaky-mode complex
wavenumber: (a) normalized phase b
z
/k
0
and (b) leakage a
z
/k
0
constants versus frequency f for an open waveguide (microstrip
operating the EH
1
mode).
distribution of equiphase and equiamplitude surfaces with
the decreasing power ow along the guide is represented
in Fig. 3c. It should be recalled that, even though the leaky
wave has a nonspectral nature, the eld generated from a
source located at a nite distance along z still satises the
radiation condition, since the eld increases transversely
only in a limited sector given by angles greater than the y
value describing the direction of power leakage [4,5].
A quantitative description of the behavior of this LWA
can be achieved with a simple evaluation of the complex
eigenvalue derivable as a modication of the dominant
mode by employing, for example, a transverse resonance
technique. To this aim, it is required a characterization of
the slit aperture in the sidewall as a circuit element in the
equivalent transmission line. For the quantication of
such discontinuities, a great deal of work has been deve-
loped, basically through variational methods [8,10]. The
solution of the relevant resonance equation in the complex
plane for the perturbed dominant mode describes the
leaky-wave behavior; for example, in Fig. 3d the equiva-
lent network for the LWA considered here is shown,
through which k
z
is determined as a function of the physi-
cal parameters of the antenna.
3. DESIGN PROCEDURES
3.1. Basic Radiative Features
For a basic LWA constituted by a single nontapered open
guiding structure, the fundamental parameters given by
pointing direction and beamwidth are simply determined
as a function of k
z
and other few basic quantities. In
y
x
z
x
z
:
[
0
x
z
0
equiamplitude surfaces
equiphase surfaces
b
a
d
E a
B G
Y
0
Y
0
G
= G' = e = 2.718, = 1.781
b
2 a
Y
0
B
= B' = ln csc
d
2 b
a e
d
b
a
ln
b
a
+
( ) ( )
Z(x) + Z(x) = 0
(a) (b)
(c)
(d)
Figure 3. LWA derived by a sidewall slit
rectangular waveguide; (a) geometry of the
structure; (b) nature of the propagation vec-
tor of the inhomogeneous plane leaky wave
(phase and attenuation vectors); (c) equip-
hase and equiamplitude planes of the leaky
wave with the relevant leakage phenomenon
along the guide; (d) equivalent transverse-
resonance network, resonance conditions,
and network parameters for evaluation of
leaky-wave complex wavenumbers as a func-
tion of the physical parameters involved.
particular, as seen before, the beam maximum direction
y
m
is mainly related to the normalized phase constant ac-
cording to the simple relationship:
sin y
m
b
z
=k
0
(4)
Since b
z
has a dispersive behavior, as is typical of wave-
guiding structures, a change in the frequency yields a
beam scanning. Typically, as the frequency is increased
from the cutoff, the pointing angle varies its direction from
around the broadside (y
m
=0
), toward the forward endre

(y
m
=90
).
Regarding the beamwidth, we recall that the leakage
constant a
z
quanties the rate of power loss along the line
due to the radiation, thus inuencing primarily the effec-
tive dimension of the equivalent aperture for the line
source; in fact, the more a
z
increases, the more the actu-
al illumination length reduces (and the less the beam-
width is focused). A basic link between the leakage
constant and the antenna length L derives from the spec-
ication of the radiation efciency Z, expressible in LWAs
as Z =[P(0) P(L)]=P(0), where P(0) is the input power
delivered to the structure and P(L) is the output power left
at the end section. The link between leakage rate and
length is generally dependent on the desired radiation
pattern and therefore on the aperture distribution. Refer-
ring to a uniform-section LWA, where a
z
is independent of
z, we obtain Z =1 exp(2a
z
L). It should also be noted
that, for narrowbeam applications, a very high increase in
efciency should require an extreme prolongation of the
line source; actually, in LWAs it typically radiates around
90% or at most 95% of the input power, where the remain-
ing power at the termination is absorbed by a matched
load to avoid a backlobe of radiation due to the reected
wave. Once the efciency is chosen, a xed link therefore
exists between the relative length in terms of wavelengths
L/l
0
and the normalized leakage constant a
z
/k
0
. For a uni-
form-section LWA, an inverse proportionality relationship
between L and a
z
is found to be of the type:
L=l
0
c=(a
z
=k
0
)
c =(1=4p) ln[1=(1 Z)]
(5)
where c is related to the value of the desired efciency
(e.g., for 90% of efciency it is c =0.185). For a tapered
section, since a
z
depends on z, the link between efciency,
length, and leakage rate is related to the chosen illumi-
nation and is more complicated.
In order to achieve narrow beams in the elevation
angle, the effective longitudinal aperture has to be suf-
ciently wide (usually several wavelengths), and this im-
plies a rather low leakage rate. The half-power ( 3-dB)
beam-width Dy is directly linkable to the normalized
antenna length L/l
0
through an approximate relationship,
which also takes into account the contribution of the scan
angle [1]
Dy a=[(L=l
0
) cos y
m
] (rad) (6)
where the proportionality factor a is dependent on the
aperture distribution. It has the most reduced value for
a constant aperture distribution (aD0.88) and increases
for tapered distributions (typically, more than unity) [1].
From the previous expression, it is seen that, since
cos y
m
k
t
=k
0
, the beamwidth can also be expressed as
Dy 2p=(k
t
L). This means that the beamwidth is, at rst
approximation, practically constant when the beam is
scanned away from broadside by varying the frequency
for air-lled LWAs (where k
t
is independent of frequency),
while it changes for dielectric-lled LWAs (where k
t
de-
pends on frequency). The effective aperture is neverthe-
less reduced for a xed antenna length as the beam
approaches endre (where the previous expression be-
comes inaccurate), and Dy anyway tends in practice to
enlarge. It can be seen that for an ideal semiinnite uni-
form structure, that is, an antenna aperture from z =0 to
z =L- > o, the beamwidth is determined by the leakage
rate only, since in this case it can be found that
Dy 2a
z
=k
t
. Moreover, in this situation the radiation pat-
tern depends only on b
z
and a
z
and does not present side-
lobes:
R(y) -
cos
2
y
(a=k
0
)
2
(b=k
0
sin y)
2
(7)
For nite antenna lengths, sidelobes are produced and the
expression for R(y) is more involved. In general the spec-
ications on the sidelobe level are related to the choice of
the aperture distribution, whose Fourier transform allows
for the derivation of the radiation pattern.
3.2. Scanning Properties
It is seen that, for LWAs derived by partially open air-lled
metallic waveguides, the beams scan in theory an angular
region from around the broadside (b
z
=k
0
0) toward one
endre (b
z
=k
0
1). In practice, around broadside the
structure works near the cutoff region of the closed wave-
guide where reactive effects are increasingly important.
Nevertheless, the leaky-wave values for b
z
/k
0
cannot be
extremely low, and at the same time a
z
/k
0
tends to increase
too much, adversely affecting the possibility of focusing
radiation at broadside. Regarding the behavior at endre
it is seen that, since b
z
/k
0
tends to unity asymptotically as
the frequency increases, in the unimodal range (where
these structures are usually employed) the beam cannot
reach so closely the endre radiation in an air-lled LWA.
Away of improving the angular scanning is to ll these
structures with dielectric materials. Thus, since in this
case the normalized phase constant approaches the
square root of the relative permittivity as the frequency
is increased (b
z
=k
0
> e
1=2
r
), the b
z
/k
0
=1 value can actual-
ly be approached in a much more restricted frequency
range. It should be noted that for such dielectric-lled
structures the beamwidth may change strongly as a func-
tion of frequency and therefore as the pointing angle var-
ies [see comments to Eq. (6)]. Moreover, it should be noted
that in many leaky structures (such as the dielectric and
printed ones), as the frequency is increased, the leaky-
mode solution changes into a guided-mode solution
through an involved transition region [2]; in this fre-
quency range, also called the spectral gap, the contribu-
tion of the leaky wave to the accurate determination of the
eld tends progressively to decrease, and generally the
structure does not work well as a LWA.
As mentioned, while the uniform LWAs usually radiate
only in the forward quadrant, with the limits specied
above, the LWAs derived from periodically modulated
slow-wave guides can start to radiate from the backward
endre in the lower frequency range. The design princi-
ples of periodic LWAs are in most part similar to those of
uniform LWAs [1,2]. The main difference lies in the char-
acterization of the fast wave that is now associated with a
Floquet space harmonic of the periodic guide [1,2]. One
can see that if a uniform guide is considered whose oper-
ating mode is slow [b
z
/k
0
41, e.g., a dielectric waveguide],
and a longitudinally periodic discontinuity is properly
added (e.g., an array of metal strips or notches, placed at
suitable distances p), such periodicity furnishes a eld ex-
pressible in an innite number of space harmonics
(b
zn
p=b
z0
p2np), where b
z0
is the phase constant of
the fundamental harmonic, which is slightly varied with
respect to the original value b
z
of the unperturbed guide.
With proper choices of the physical parameters, it is in
general possible to make only one harmonic fast (typically,
the n= 1 one), so that it can radiate as a leaky wave
(presence of an additional attenuation constant a
z
).
In this case, the phase constant of this fast harmonic
can assume both positive and negative values
(1ob
z
=k
0
o1), as a function of the parameters involved;
in particular, as frequency is increased, the beam starts to
radiate from backward endre toward the broadside. In
general, also periodic LWAs can have difculties in work-
ing well in the broadside region, since usually for periodic
structures there exists an open stopband [1], where the
attenuation constant rapidly increases, resulting in a wid-
ening beamwidth. As the frequency is further increased
after broadside, the beam is then scanned also in the for-
ward quadrant. In periodic LWAs, depending on the choice
of the design parameters, additional limitations in the
forward scanning behavior could exist when a second har-
monic also starts to radiate before the rst harmonic
reaches its endre, thus limiting the scanning range of
the single beam [1,3].
3.3. Leaky-Wave Arrays
If an increase of directivity in the cross-plane is desired, a
simple improvement for LWAs based on long radiating
slots can be achieved by a physical enlargement of the
transverse aperture (e.g., with a ared transition to en-
large the effective cross-aperture). As said before, a more
efcient way to increase directivity in the cross-plane is to
use a number of radiators placed side-by-side at suitable
lateral distances, thus constituting a linear array: it is
then possible to achieve radiation with a focused pencil
beam. In addition, if properly phased, these arrays of
LWAs allow a 2D scanning of the beam; in the elevation
plane, as is typical for LWAs, the scanning is achievable by
varying the frequency, while in the cross-plane the scan-
ning is achievable with phase shifters that vary the phase
difference among the single-line sources. As noted, in
LWAs only a one-dimensional number of phase shifters
is therefore necessary, with particular structural simplic-
ity and economic advantage if compared to all the usual
radiators requiring a two-dimensional number of shifters
for the scanning. Additional desirable features of such ar-
rays are in general the absence of blindspots and good
polarization properties [8,9].
For the analysis of such LWarrays, an efcient method
is that one based on the unit cell approach [8,9]. In this
way, it is possible to derive the behavior of the global
structure by referring to a single radiator taking into ac-
count the mutual effects due to the presence of all the
others. In the equivalent network this is achievable by
changing only the description of the radiation termination
for a periodic-type array environment (innite number of
linear elements); in particular, an active admittance can
be quantied, which describes the external radiating re-
gion as a function of the geometry and of the scan angle.
More sophisticated numerical techniques also allow for
accurate analyses of arrays by taking into account the
mutual couplings for a nite number of elements.
3.4. Pattern Shaping
In the basic requirements of the LWAs radiation pattern,
in addition to the specication for the maximum of the
beam direction and for its half-power width, the sidelobe
behavior also has a primary importance. In general, it is
required to derive the properties of the source in connec-
tion with a desired radiation pattern. Since LWAs can be
viewed as aperture antennas with a current distribution
having a certain illumination A(z), it is possible to obtain
the far eld through a standard relationship [13]:
E(y) =G(y)
_
L
0
[A(z
/
)[e
j Arg [A(z
/
)]
e
jkz
/
sin y
dz
/
(8)
The radiation pattern for E is expressed in terms of a
Fourier transform of the line-source complex current dis-
tribution on the aperture multiplied by the pattern of the
element current G (e.g., a magnetic dipole).
It is easily seen that if the LWA geometry is kept lon-
gitudinally constant, the amplitude distribution has an
exponential decay of the type exp( a
z
z). As is known, this
behavior furnishes a quite poor radiation pattern for the
sidelobes that are rather high (around 13 dB). It there-
fore derives that, in conjunction with the choice of a xed
illumination function A(z) giving a desired sidelobe be-
havior (cosine, square cosine, triangular, Taylor, etc.), the
leakage rate has to be modulated along the direction z of
the line source: in practice this is achievable by properly
modifying the cross section of the LWA structure along z
with the so-called tapering procedure. Considering that,
for a smoothly tapered antenna, the power radiated per
unit length from the antenna aperture is simply related
to the aperture distribution [viz., dP(z)=dz =2a
z
(z)
P(z) =c[A(z)[
2
], a useful analytical expression for a
z
(z) as
a function of the amplitude A(z), of the line-source length
L, and of the efciency Z is obtainable [13]:
a
z
(z) =
1
2
[A(z)[
2
1
Z
_
L
0
[A(z
/
)[
2
dz
/
_
z
0
[A(z
/
)[
2
dz
/
(9)
From Eq. (9) it is also seen that the more the efciency is
desired high (around unity), the more a
z
has to increase
towards extremely high values around the terminal sec-
tion (as mentioned, efciency in common practice does not
exceed 9095%).
For narrowbeam applications, in the tapering proce-
dure the longitudinal modication of the geometry should
be made in an appropriate way in order to affect only the
leakage constant, taking into account the fact that the
phase constant should conversely be maintained the same
(b
z
should not depend on z in order to have the correct
pointing angle for each elementary current contribution
on the aperture).
The pattern shaping procedure requires therefore the
knowledge of the phase and leakage constants as a func-
tion of the geometric parameters of the chosen structure,
and this is achievable, as mentioned, by nding the suit-
able complex eigensolution with numerical methods. In
general, for beam shaping, either when it is required a
proper a
z
distribution with b
z
constant (for narrow beams)
or when a
z
and b
z
have to assume suitable longitudinal
patterns (for wide beams), the procedure is strongly sim-
plied if it is possible to nd geometric parameters
through which the leakage and phase constants are var-
ied as independently as possible. This property is related
to the topology characteristics of the waveguiding struc-
ture [1,12].
4. REALIZATION
4.1. Types of Leaky-Wave Antennas
The various LWAs topologies that have been investigated
in the literature are based on different solutions derived
by waveguiding structures. We briefly survey the main
classes proposed in the applications:
1. Some LWAs based on partially open metallic wave-
guides are presented in Fig. 4. Figure 4a shows a top
wall slitted rectangular guide LWA; Fig. 4b, a stub-
loaded rectangular guide LWA; and Fig. 4c, a
stepped rectangular guide LWA [12]. Many other
solutions have been proposed for this class of radi-
ators, based on groove guide, ridge guide, and so on [1].
2. Examples of structures based on hybrid metallic/
dielectric guides are given in Fig. 5; a basic cong-
uration of nonradiative dielectric (NRD) waveguide
can be suitably modied to obtain a foreshortened
(Fig. 5a) and asymmetric (Fig. 5b) NRD LWAs [1].
3. Congurations of printed-circuit LWAs are shown in
Fig. 6; a basic uniform microstrip LWA operating on
a leaky higher-order mode is shown in Fig. 6a, a
periodically loaded microstrip LWA is in Fig. 6b, and
a periodical meander microstrip LWA is in Fig. 6c [1].
4. In basic dielectric guides, a periodic loading is re-
quired in order to isolate a suitable fast-wave space
harmonic from the intrinsically slow-wave guiding
structure. The most usual periodic perturbation is
represented by grating of grooves or metal strips,
usually placed in the top surface of the guide
(Fig. 7a); also lateral metal patches can be used in
hybrid forms (dielectric/microstrip) (Fig. 7b); the re-
duction of the beamwidth in the cross plane with
ared horns has also been employed (Fig. 7c) [1]. All
these topologies are good candidates, particularly for
b
a
x
z
y
W
b
1
b
r
(a)
(b)
(c)
Figure 4. Metallic-guide LWAs: (a) top-wall slitted rectangular
guide LWA; (b) stub-loaded rectangular guide LWA; (c) stepped
rectangular guide LWA.
high-frequency applications (millimeter and submil-
limeter waves), where the use of dielectric instead of
metal for the guidance can reduce losses.
5. It has to be noted that in uniform planar dielectric
LWAs based on a single layer usually present quite
high leakage values, with consequent weak capabil-
ity in focusing radiation. A significant improvement
is achievable by properly dimensioning a substrate/
superstrate structure (Fig. 8a), where a simple ele-
ment (dipole or slot) is able to excite a leaky wave
giving a conical highly directive beam. This basic
topology can be arranged to allow for a very focused
pencil beam with a limited number of radiating el-
ements in form of widely spaced array (Fig. 8b).
Feed, Losses, and Manufacture
Feeding LWAs is often quite simple; in particular, for
LWAs derived by metal guides, the feed is represented
by a continuous transition from the closed structure acting
on a suitable guided mode to the related open one acting
on a perturbed (leaky) mode. Tapered transitions from the
closed to the open structures can be realized to reduce the
discontinuity effects and the possible excitation of spuri-
ous modes that could arise from abrupt transitions. At the
output termination, the introduction of a matched load
can strongly decrease the remaining power that, if reect-
ed, should give rise to a backlobe in a direction symmetric
to the mainbeam with respect to the broadside. The use of
dielectric structures as LWAs can present more difculties
for efcient feeding and coupling, particularly in planar
congurations. Attention has to be paid to obtain a good
launching of the desired leaky wave, avoiding the exci-
tation of additional guided and leaky modes. For planar
guides, such as microstrip or layered dielectrics, local cou-
pling elements (such as slot or dipoles) are usually em-
ployed to excite the leaky mode from an input line toward
the radiating line [9].
Ohmic losses seldom affect the radiative performance of
LWAs significantly, since the attenuation due to the leak-
age of radiated power is generally more inuent than the
attenuation due to dissipated power in the practical guid-
ing structure. However, since power loss can be excessive
as frequency increases, particularly for LWAs based on
quasi-closed metal guides, the choice of open guides with
dielectrics and a limited use of metal is naturally advis-
able for millimeter-wave applications.
The general simplicity of LWA structures makes their
manufacture usually easy to perform, even though differ-
ent construction problems can arise depending on the cho-
sen topology and the frequency range. Simple structures
are particularly desirable at millimeter waves, due to the
d
b
a
x
z
y
c
r
a t
b
E
c
r
E
(a) (b)
Figure 5. Hybrid metallic/dielectric LWAs: (a) foreshortened
nonradiative dielectric (NRD) LWA; (b) asymmetric NRD LWA.
y
z
x
c
r
Load Load
Resonators
Feed line
Feed
point
E plane
zm
zm 2
Resonators
Feed
line
E plane
zm
2
(a)
(b) (c)
Figure 6. Printed-line LWAs: (a) uniform high-
er-mode microstrip LWAspace-wave radiation
can be associated, for instance, with the strip
current distribution of the EH
1
mode, which is
leaky in a suitable frequency range; (b) a pair of
periodically loaded microstrip LWAs; (c) a pair
of periodical meander microstrip LWAs.
reduced dimensions. On the other hand, oversimplied
shapes seldom allow good control of radiation perfor-
mance. In particular, a delicate aspect concerns the usu-
ally small longitudinal modications of the geometry
related to tapering for beam control. In this case, an ac-
curate determination of the fabrication inaccuracies and
tolerances has particular importance to avoid overwhelm-
ing the required geometric variations for tapering, thus
degrading the improvements of the pattern shaping.
Finally, in specific applications, the practical effects of
radomes for environmental protection have to be taken
into account.
4.2. Measurement Techniques
The radiation properties of LWAs can be tested experi-
mentally through different types of measurement, most of
them applicable to aperture antennas. Some basic param-
eters, such as efciency and mismatching effects, can be
measured directly through the transmission and/or reec-
tion scattering parameters with a network analyzer. Ra-
diation patterns and directivity properties as a function of
the observation angles (y and f in the zenith and azimuth
planes, respectively) can be measured for various frequen-
cy values with different techniques, on the aperture, in the
radiating near eld (Fresnel region), and in the far eld
(Fraunhofer region). In particular, measurements on the
aperture are quite easy to perform. A measurement of the
eld in the close proximity of the aperture can be achieved
with a small pickup element (e.g., an electric dipole probe
placed parallel to the aperture electric eld). Amplitude
and phase of the signal received by the probe are thus
measurable through a network analyzer, with possible
compensation techniques related to the mutual coupling
between the current distribution on the aperture and the
current probe element. As said, from the determination of
c
r
Metal
ground
plane
c
r
Metal
ground
plane
c
r
Metal
flare
Dielectric
Leaky-Wave
Antenna
Metal
ground
plane
c
r
Dielectric
waveguide
Microstrip
patch
antennas
(a)
(b) (c)
Figure 7. Dielectric-guide LWAs: (a) a pair of periodically loaded dielectric LWAs; (b) dielectric
insular guide LWAwith metallic patches; (c) dielectric LWAwith a ared horn to reduce the cross-
plane beamwidth.
c
r
x
0
x
z
t
B
c
2
, j
2
c
1
, j
1
(a)
(b)
Figure 8. Planar LWAs: (a) layered-dielectric LWA based on a
substrate/superstrate structure with an electric-dipole excitation;
(b) high-gain LWarrays of widely spaced elements in a substrate/
superstrate structure excited through slots: linear and planar
congurations.
these basic parameters, a complete knowledge of the ra-
diative characteristics is easily achievable in LWAs.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. A. A. Oliner, Leaky-wave antennas, in R. C. Johnson, ed.,
Antenna Engineering Handbook, 3rd ed., McGraw-Hill, New
York, 1993.
2. R. E. Collin and F. J. Zucker, Antenna Theory, Mc-Graw-Hill,
New York, 1969.
3. C. H. Walter, Traveling Wave Antennas, McGraw-Hill, New
York, 1965; Peninsula Publishing, Los Altos, CA, reprint,
1990.
4. T. Tamir and A. A. Oliner, Guided complex waves, Parts I and
II, Proc. IEE 110:310334 (1963).
5. T. Tamir, Inhomogeneous wave types at planar interfaces:
IIILeaky waves, Optik 38:269297 (1973).
6. I. Ohtera, Diverging/focusing of electromagnetic waves by
utilizing the curved leakywave structure: Application to
broad-beam antenna for radiating within specied wide-
angle, IEEE Trans. Anten. Propag. AP-47:14701475 (1999).
7. P. Burghignoli, F. Frezza, A. Galli, and G. Schettini, Synthesis
of broad-beam patterns through leaky-wave antennas with
rectilinear geometry, Anten. Wireless Propag. Lett. 2:136139
(2003).
8. A. A. Oliner, Scannable Millimeter Wave Arrays, Final Report
on RADC Contract No. F19628-84-K-0025, Polytechnic Univ.,
New York, 1988.
9. P. Baccarelli, P. Burghignoli, F. Frezza, A. Galli, and P. Lamp-
ariello, Novel modal properties and relevant scanning behav-
iors of phased arrays of microstrip leaky-wave antennas,
IEEE Trans. Anten. Propag., AP-51:32283238 (2003).
10. T. Itoh, ed., Numerical Techniques for Microwave and Milli-
meter-Wave Passive Structures, Wiley, New York, 1989.
11. F. Mesa, C. Di Nallo, and D. R. Jackson, The theory of surface-
wave and space-wave leaky-mode excitation on microstrip
lines, IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech. MTT-47:207215
(1999).
12. C. Di Nallo, F. Frezza, A. Galli, G. Gerosa, and P. Lampariello,
Stepped leaky-wave antennas for microwave and millimeter-
wave applications, Ann. Telecommun. 52:202208 (1997).
LEFT-HANDED MATERIALS FOR MICROWAVE
DEVICES AND CIRCUITS
CLIFFORD M. KROWNE
Naval Research Laboratory
Washington, DC
1. INTRODUCTION
The use of so-called left-handed materials in the construc-
tion of components for physics instruments or electronic
devices is an extremely new area to blossom. The materi-
als themselves display a different property of matter
compared to ordinary matter relative to the propagation
or motion of electromagnetic waves through them. In
ordinary matter, through which one sends light, the
energy ow or power travels in the same direction as the
phase front or phase motion of the wave. This is not unlike
what one would see after dropping a pebble in a pond of
water and then observing the ripples. The motion started
by initially dropping the pebble in the pond tends to
spread out from the point of initial impact where the
pebble entered the water surface. As anyone who has
seen this phenomenon can attest to, ripples emanate
from the initial entry point, and continue in time to spread
out, producing increasingly large circles, whose radial
distance from the initial entry point increases. One can
see that the power ows radially away from the initial
point. Also, the phase front of the wave, measured by
following a wave crest or trough, also ows radially away
from the initial point. So at any given location, the
direction of both the power ow and the wave front are
the same, or codirectional, and perpendicular to the wave
crest, which is in the shape of a circle. If we represent the
power ow by a vector, called the Poynting vector P and
the phase front by another vector k at any given location
in coordinate space r, we can say that P
.
k > 0, where the
dot indicates the multiplication of two vectors, called the
dot product. Of course, for our example of the pebble in the
pond, the problem in computing the dot product is trivial
because for any r location, which in rectilinear coordinates
is specied by x, y, and z, P and k point in the same
direction, and when this occurs, the dot product must both
be positive and have a maximum value (Fig. 1a). A more
complex situation would be when these two vectors do not
point in the same direction (Fig. 1b). This is still not a
problem, because we still know how to compute the dot
product of two noncollinear vectors. One simply projects
one vector onto the other vector, a process that produces
the answer Pk cos y. Here P is the magnitude of the vector
P, k the magnitude of the vector k, and y the angle
between them. The cosinusoidal function of y creates the
dot product.
Left-handed materials do not produce positive dot
products between the power and phase vectors. Rather,
they have P
.
ko0, in apparent contradiction to what we
P
k
r
(a)
Pebble in Pond
P
k
(b)
Figure 1. (a) Example of relationship between the power ow

vector Pand the phase vector k for a pebble dropped into a pond at
its centerred denotes the location of the crests in the waves
emanating fromthe pond center; (b) nonparallel power Pand phase
k vectors, with an angle y between them. (This gure is available in
full color at http://www.mrw.interscience.wiley.com/erfme.)
LEFT-HANDED MATERIALS FOR MICROWAVE DEVICES AND CIRCUITS 2303
understand to be normal behavior. However, there is
nothing fundamental that dictates, on the basis of Max-
wells equations, that the product must always be positive.
Since it is known that the Poynting vector is equal to the
cross-product of the electric E and magnetic H elds, or
EH, in normal matter it can be demonstrated that E, H,
and k form a right-handed system (see Fig. 2a). Clearly, if
k points oppositely to P, the triad E,H,k must form a
left-handed system (see Fig. 2b); this is how the term
left-handed material arose. Sometimes left-handed ma-
terial is abbreviated LHM. Similarly, for ordinary matter,
or right-handed material, we can use RHM. Left-
handed materials have also been variously referred to as
negative-index-of-refraction materials (NIMs or NIRMs),
negative-phase-velocity materials (NPVs or NPVMs),
backward wave materials (BWMs), and negative permit-
tivity and permeability materials (DNMs or NMs). In the
latter acronym, the D indicates double because both
the permittivity and permeability are simultaneously
negative. To see that the dual assignment of negative
constitutive parameters of a materials leads to a left-
handed arrangement of the vector triad, it is sufcient
to examine Maxwells two curl equations. Index of refrac-
tion is a concept arising from optics, and merely gives the
ratio between the speed of light in the material in compar-
ison to free space or a vacuum. It is usually denoted by the
letter n.
Interest in left-handed media (LHM) originally arose
because of its purported ability in combination with right-
handed (RHM) or ordinary media to allow unusual focus-
ing of waves, with possible applications in subwavelength
control of optical imaging and negative-index-of-refraction
(NIR) behavior leading to new radar uses [1]. Denite
proof of NIR has occurred in several laboratories, and
there is little question that focusing possibilities exist in
the much lower frequency microwave/millimeter wave-
length regimes compared to the optical regime, although
it is now known that imperfect focusing is the best that
can be expected. However, this should present no funda-
mental stumbling block as long as we do not require
perfect focusing performance of imaging systems. Thus,
applications can be foreseen in the radiocommunication
bands. As far as providing focusing capability at the much
higher optical frequencies, that is still an unresolved
question. One unusual property of the LHM in conjunc-
tion with RHM is the ability to take diverging or parallel
rays of light and focus them with a at plate of LHM. A
normal concave lens will now cause rays of light hitting it
from a source to diverge, but a convex lens will focus the
light rays. These unusual behaviors of LHM were pointed
out in the late 1960s in the Russian physics literature [2].
However, the possibility of backward wave behavior has
been known since the 1950s and is available in both the
American and British physics and electronics literature.
So for half a century or so, something has been known
about LHM. The earliest work involved backward wave
propagation in traveling-wave tubes [3,4] or microwave or
millimeter-wave devices and models using nonreciprocal
materials [5] or higher-order modes. This earliest work
generally involved propagation in one dimension, or di-
mensions lower than three, as opposed to the left-handed
phenomena occurring in any wave direction. When left-
handed behavior occurs in any direction, the property is
called isotropic, meaning that the behavior is seen for any
arbitrary propagation direction. Isotropy is what allows
the unlimited focusing property that was discussed in the
Russian literature in the late 1960s, and which generated
the tremendous interest in the physics community world-
wide in the late 1990s.
In contrast to the imaging and radar applications
stemming from LHM, potential electronic uses may also
exist because new physics of propagation in left-handed
media occur in structures compatible with integrated
circuits. Treating the LHM as intrinsic with microscopic
properties that may be described by constitutive relations
relating the displacement eld or electric ux density D
and electric eld intensity E (i.e., D=eE) and relating the
magnetic ux density B to magnetic eld intensity H, (i.e.,
B=mH), the electromagnetic elds within guided-wave
structures employed in integrated circuits can be studied.
Completely new dispersion diagrams and electromagnetic
eld congurations have been found, and it has been
proved that propagation in these devices enables regions
of forward and backward waves to exist [6]. Such new
propagation behavior is in agreement with more recent
macroscopic realizations using lumped/distributed circuit
elements to make backward wave circuits [7]. These
circuits show that various transmission lines, couplers,
and other circuit elements with different or improved
characteristics may be produced. It is expected that the
same could be done for lters, producing devices with new
properties or improved characteristics, since propagating
and evanescent frequency bands exist in the dispersion
diagram. Additionally, the new electromagnetic eld dis-
tributions strongly imply that improved isolators and
circulators [8] could be constructed using LHM in combi-
nation with nonreciprocal materials based on carrier
cyclotron motion or spin precession. New control compo-
nents using reciprocal media are also possible by teaming
up LHM with ferroelectric materials [9], for example.
The knowledge that backward waves can be produced
from discrete inductor and capacitor arrangements con-
gured as unit cells in a transmission system has been
known for a long time, and standard textbooks date back
to 1967 [10]. This is the origin of the lumped/distributed
E
H
P
k
(a)
E
H
P k
(b)
RHM LHM
Figure 2. Orientation of the electric E, magnetic H, power P,
and phase k vectors in (a) a right-handed material (RHM) and
(b) a left-handed material (LHM). (This gure is available in full
color at http://www.mrw.interscience.wiley.com/erfme.)
2304 LEFT-HANDED MATERIALS FOR MICROWAVE DEVICES AND CIRCUITS
elements mentioned above and employed in circuits made
using ordinary materials to obtain the backward wave
behavior. Dating even further back is the idea that
periodic waveguiding structures, with nite-sized unit
cells, require the superposition of an innite set of discrete
modes to determine the eld at any given location in the
repetition direction, call it z. The result of the super-
position is to create what is sometimes referred to as
space harmonics, a coupled system of modes that to-
gether satisfy the periodic boundary conditions of the
structure. But what also occurs from this superposition
with repetition distance d is a kfrequency f diagram
repeated innitely in reciprocal space of period size 2p/d.
If we call k
0
the phase behavior within the basic reciprocal
unit cell, then the general phase solution includes all the
harmonics, stated mathematically as k
n
=k
0
2pn/d, n=
0, 71, 72, . . . ; o [11]. Thus all periodic circuits and
structures have an equal number of forward and backward
space harmonics.
We will direct our attention in this article, therefore, to
the most original area of left-handed materials and de-
vices, those that utilize intrinsic crystalline properties of
the material, as opposed to those using lumped elements
consisting of capacitive or inductive sections, or RHM
transmission lengths, which has been the approach of
more recent work producing backward wave devices and
circuits. The easiest way to produce intrinsic LHM crystal-
line properties in a guided-wave device is to choose
metallic rods and split rings with gaps and to repeat
them in a lattice where the repeat distance is much
shorter than the effective wavelength. This arrangement
is shown schematically in Fig. 3a, and was used in a
different context to produce some of the initial results
giving rise to the hope in the physics community that
optical focusing could be possible given the proof of
principle at microwave frequencies (on the order of 5
15 GHz) [12]. But ideally, one would like to have a single-
crystalline substrate of material as in Fig. 3b, at the
microscopic level. Barring this possibility, another way
to make LHM is to combine a layer of crystalline material
that has the desired negative permittivity eo0 with
another layer of crystalline material which has the desired
permeability mo0. This two-layered structure is shown in
Fig. 3c. It is even possible that these uniform layers of
material could be amorphous and not crystalline. All that
would be needed for this concept to work is that each
individual layer be substantially less than the wavelength
sampling the combination in the vertical direction [13].
This sampling may be evaluated by hitting the two-
layered combination by an incident wave as in Fig. 4a
and comparing the reected and transmitted response to
the single-layer case in Fig. 4b. It might even be desirable
to make multilayered combinations as in Fig. 3d with
alternating layers of negative permittivity eo0 with

Metal
Air
RHM
Inclusion Method
Air

Metal
(a)
(b) (c)
Air
||

||
Metal
Single Layer Method
Bilayer Bulk Method
|| & ||
|| , ||
Metal
Air

Multi-Layered Method

Metal
Air
(d) (e)
Superlattice Method
||
||
||
||
Figure 3. Various arrangements of matter to
form intrinsic crystalline double-negative ma-
terial (DNM) or left-handed material (LHM)
from (a) inclusions of metallic rods and split
resonator rings in a normal RHM or double-
positive material (DPM) host, (b) a single-
crystalline substance or a single amorphous
substance, (c) a bilayer combination of two
materials with one having eo0 but m40 and
the other having mo0 but e40, (d) multiple
stacked bilayers, and (e) a heterostructure or
superlattice, which creates one of the two
bilayers (or both) from (c). (This gure is
available in full color at http://www.mrw.
negative permeability mo0. Finally, in an extension of the
idea in Fig. 3d, heterostructure or superlattice repetitions
of layers could be made on the scale of nanometers to
produce to the simultaneous eo0 and mo0, as in Fig. 3e.
Fig. 5 shows an e/m plot for DNM or LHM (in the elliptical
region) in comparison to other materials already charac-
terized in terms of their basic physical properties. Roughly
speaking, electromagnetic waves can propagate in the
rst and third quadrants of the chart whereas the waves
are evanescent or nonpropagating in the second and
fourth quadrants. What material processes will be utilized
to combine some of the other materials in the chart into
DNM, or what new developments will occur to produce
completely new materials for DNM await the future.
Next, the electromagnetic eld theory and physics of
the DNM will be combined into a governing equation
describing the guided-wave DNM problem. Once the
governing equation is found, mathematics is done to cast
the problem in terms of a Greens function solution. The
Greens function approach nds the solution to the DNM
structure as if it were hit by a singularity forcing function
(in our case it is actually currents on the guiding strip
conductor) on an innitely narrow strip (such as a wire in
two dimensions that forms a point), and then uses this
simplied and general function to nd the actual solution.
From the Greens function for the DNM structure, the
electromagnetic elds formulas can be found, and the
elds can be computed by using a computer code employ-
ing numerical techniques.
2. GOVERNING EQUATION FOR GUIDED-WAVE DNM
SUBSTRATE MATERIALS
Maxwells time-varying equations describe the electro-
magnetic eld behavior in a medium if they are combined
with constitutive relationships embedding the physical
properties of the medium in them. Maxwells two curl
equations are
VE(t; x) =
@B(t; x)
@t
;
VH(t; x) =
@D(t; x)
@t
J(t; x)
(1)
Constitutive relationships are
D(t; x) =
"
" ee" eeE(t; x)
"
" rr" rrH(t; x);
B(t; x) =
"
" rr" rr
/
E(t; x)
"
" mm" mmH(t; x)
(2)
Here x=(x
1
,x
2
,x
3
) =(x,y,z). Most general NPV medium can
have all constitutive tensors in (2) nonzero, including the
magnetoelectric or optical activity tensors
"
" rr" rr and
"
" rr" rr
/
, as they
are sometimes denoted. The formulation is therefore kept

(a)
(b)
Bilayer Equivalency to Single Layer
||
||
|| , ||
TM
x or z
: P-polarization: H
y
E
z
E
x
H
x
H
z
TE
x or z
: S-polarization: E
y
Figure 4. Equivalency of a bilayer and a
single DNM or LHM layer is demonstrated
using wave transmission (and reection) of
transverse electric (s-polarization) or trans-
verse magnetic (p-polarization) waves. (This
gure is available in full color at http://
D
i
e
l
e
c
t
r
i
c
s
Ferromagnets
Ferrites

P
l
a
s
m
a
s
Propagating
Propagating
Non-Propagating
Non-Propagating
Left-
Handed
Media
M
e
t
a
l
s

&

S
e
m
i
c
Figure 5. Permittivity epermeability m chart showing where DNM
or LHM lie in relation to other materials. (This gure is available in
general in order to retain the most exibility for studying
materials with widely varying physical properties. Be-
cause many problems are often transparent in the
frequency domain, and because nonharmonic problems
can be resolved into a superposition of time-harmonic
components, we elect to study here time-harmonic electro-
magnetic wave propagation through the solid-state
LHM-RHM structure (RHM=right-handed-medium, or
ordinary medium). Taking the time harmonic variation
to be of a form e
iot
, Maxwells equation become
VE(x) = ioB(x); VH(x) =ioD(x) J(x) (3)
with the constitutive relationships dropping the explicit t
dependence
D(x) =
"
" ee" ee(o)E(x)
"
" rr" rr(o)H(x);
B(x) =
"
" rr" rr
/
(o)E(x)
"
" mm" mm(o)H(x)
(4)
Dependence of the constitutive parameters on radian
frequency is a well recognized fact, and that is why explicit
variation on o is shown. However, for the study to be
conducted here at specic frequencies, we do not need to
call out this dependence explicitly. We will be setting, for
example,
"
" ee" ee(o) =v for o=o
v
. Therefore, we set
D(x) =
"
" ee" eeE(x)
"
" rr" rrH(x); B(x) =
"
" rr" rr
/
E(x)
"
" mm" mmH(x) (5)
and understand it means (2).
Curl equations (1) may be combined into a single
governing equation [14]
L
T
(x)V
L
(x) =ioV
R
(x) (6)
where the matrix partial differential operator acting on
the EH column vector is
L
T
(x) =
0 L
q
(x)
L
q
(x) 0
_ _
(7)
where the quadrant operator is
L
q
(x) =
0
@
@z
@
@y
@
@z
0
@
@x
@
@y
@
@x
0
_
_
_
_
(8)
Vectors in (6) are
V
L
(x) =
E
x
E
y
E
z
H
x
H
y
H
z
_
_
_
_
=
E
H
_ _
; V
R
(x) =
D
x
D
y
D
z
B
x
B
y
B
z
_
_
_
_
=
D
B
_ _
(9)
Restricting ourselves to a guided-wave structure with
the wave traveling in a uniform crosssection in the z
direction, that is, where the wave has the form e
iot gz
, g
=g(o), simplies (6)(8) to
L
T
(x; y)V
L
(x; y) =ioV
R
(x; y) (10a)
L
T
(x; y) =
0 L
q
(x; y)
L
q
(x; y) 0
_ _
(10b)
L
q
(x; y) =
0 g
@
@y
g 0
@
@x
@
@y
@
@x
0
_
_
_
_
(10c)
Finally, there are certain advantages for approaching
the problem in the Fourier transform domain, not the least
of which is that real-space convolution integrals reduce to
products, and so for the integral equation technique to be
applied to a nite enclosed region in the x direction, with
layering in the y direction, the nite Fourier transform
pair
F(k
x
; y) =
_
b
b
F(x; y)e
ikxx
dx;
F
i
(k
x
; y) =
_
b
b
F
i
(x; y)e
ik
x
x
dx
(11a)
F(x; y) =
1
2b
o
k
x
=o
F(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
;
F
i
(x; y) =
1
2b
o
kx =o
F
i
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
(11b)
is applied to the elds, converting (10) into
L
T
(k
x
; y)V
L
(k
x
; y) =ioV
R
(k
x
; y) (12a)
L
T
(k
x
; y) =
0 L
q
(k
x
; y)
L
q
(k
x
; y) 0
_ _
(12b)
L
q
(k
x
; y) =
0 g
@
@y
g 0 ik
x
@
@y
ik
x
0
_
_
_
_
(12c)
Constitutive relationships (2) can be combined into a
supertensor
V
R
(t; x) =MV
L
(t; x); M=
"
" ee" ee
"
" rr" rr
"
" rr" rr
/
"
" mm" mm
_ _
(13)
and using the harmonic transformation leading to (5)
V
R
(x) =M(o)V
L
(x) (14)
Characterization of the wave by the complex propagation
constant reduces (14) to
V
R
(x; y) =M(o)V
L
(x; y) (15)
When the nite Fourier transform is applied to (15), we
obtain
V
R
(k
x
; y) =M(o)V
L
(k
x
; y) (16)
Inserting this formula describing the material physics into
electromagnetic equation yields, after eliminating V
R
, the
following equation:
L
T
(k
x
; y)V
L
(k
x
; y) =ioM(o)V
L
(k
x
; y) (17)
This matrix equation can in principle be solved for the
normal-mode eigenvectors and eigenvalues g =g(o), rea-
lizing that the 16 column vectors and the 66 operator
and material tensor square matrices use the full electro-
magnetic eld component set. However, because we will
restrict ourselves to canonical layered structures (layered
in the y directionsee in Fig. 6 cross-sectional and topside
views of a DNM or LHM multilayered structure), it is very
convenient to extract the perpendicular eld components
from (17) using rows 2 and 5, which do not possess
differential operator @/@y:
gV
4
ik
x
V
6
=io
6
i =1
m
2i
V
i
(18a)
gV
1
ik
x
V
3
=io
6
i =1
m
5i
V
i
(18b)
Solution of the pair of equations in (18) is
V
i
=
6
j =1
a
ij
(1 d
2; j
)(1 d
5; j
)V
j
; i =2; 5 (19)
where d
i; j
is the Kronecker delta function, or
E
y
=a
21
E
x
a
23
E
z
a
24
H
x
a
26
H
z
(20a)
H
y
=a
51
E
x
a
53
E
z
a
54
H
x
a
56
H
z
(20b)
Here a
ij
are given by
a
ij
=
a
/
ij
D
a
(21)
D
a
=m
22
m
55
m
25
m
52
(22)
a
/
21
=m
25
m
51
ig
o
_ _
m
21
m
55
(23a)
a
/
23
=m
25
m
53
k
x
o
_ _
m
23
m
55
(23b)
a
/
24
=m
25
m
54
m
55
m
24
ig
o
_ _
(23c)
a
/
26
=m
25
m
56
m
55
m
26
k
x
o
_ _
(23d)
a
/
51
=m
52
m
21
m
22
m
51
ig
o
_ _
(23e)
a
/
53
=m
52
m
23
m
22
m
53
k
x
o
_ _
(23f )
a
/
54
=m
52
m
24
ig
o
_ _
m
22
m
54
(23g)
a
/
56
=m
52
m
26
k
x
o
_ _
m
22
m
56
(23h)
Here M consists of the set {m
ij
} of elements.
The governing equation of the problem can be acquired
by realizing that rows 1, 3, 4, and 6 of (17) contain rst-
order linear differential equations:
gV
5
dV
6
dy
=io
6
i =1
m
1i
V
i
(24a)
dV
4
dy
ik
x
V
5
=io
6
i =1
m
3i
V
i
(24b)
gV
2
dV
3
dy
=io
6
i =1
m
4i
V
i
(24c)
dV
1
dy
ik
x
V
2
=io
6
i =1
m
6i
V
i
(24d)
With the help of (19) to remove V
2
and V
5
from (24), we
obtain
dF
dy
=ioRF (25)
F=
V
1
V
3
V
4
V
6
_
_
_
_
=
E
x
E
z
H
x
H
z
_
_
_
_
(26)
r
1j
=m
6y
a
5y
m
65
a
2y
m
62
k
x
o
_ _
(27a)
r
2j
= m
4y
a
5y
m
45
a
2y
m
42
ig
o
_ _ _ _
(27b)
r
3j
= m
3y
a
2y
m
32
a
5y
m
35
k
x
o
_ _ _ _
(27c)
r
4j
=m
1y
a
2y
m
12
a
5y
m
15
ig
o
_ _
(27d)
Here the y(j) index on a
ij
is dened by
y(j) =
3
2
j; j =2; 4
3j 1
2
; j =1; 3
_
_
(28)
Here R consists of the set {r
ij
} of elements.
The Greens function problem is posed by placing a
Dirac delta forcing function
J
sd
(x) =( ^ xx ^ zz)d(x x
/
) (29)
on the strip conductor (which could be an ordinary metal
or a superconductor) and solving the partial-differential
equation system in space subject to appropriate boundary
and interfacial conditions. Equation (29) says that a sur-
face current of unit delta magnitude is impressed in the x
and z directions. This is consistent with the strip having
width w in the x direction, innitesimal extent in the y
direction, and extending innitely in the z direction
corresponding to a uniform cross section. Because we
have Fourier-transformed the problem into the spectral
domain, the impressed delta current now appears as
J
sd
(k
x
) =( ^ xx ^ zz)
_
b
b
d(x x
/
) e
ikxx
/
dx
/
=( ^ xx ^ zz) e
ikxx
/
(30)
where 2b is the nite width of the enclosure bounding the
x extent. Of course, the actual current is a continuous
superposition of weighted contributions over the following
strip width:
J
s
(x) =
_
w=2
w=2
J
s;x
(x
/
) ^ xx J
s;z
(x
/
) ^ zz
_
d(x x
/
)dx
=
_
w=2
w=2
J
s
(x
/
)d(x x
/
)dx
(31)
Here we have been using the fact that current exists only
on the strip. Equation (31) merely states that scanning the
extent of the strip (with the delta function) will reproduce
the correct current distribution function. Now one can
state that (3) and (14) having assumed a time-harmonic
variation, or (10a) and (15) assuming a z-directed propa-
gation constant also, form a complete set of partial-diffe-
rential equations subject to the interfacial conditions
^ yy H
_ _
=J
s
(x) (32)
E
t
=E
t
(33)
and boundary conditions
E
y
(x; y) =E
z
(x; y) =0; x = b (34a)
E
x
(x; y) =E
z
(x; y) =0; y =0; h
T
(34b)
Equation (32), which arose from curl equation (3), says
that the tangential H eld above the interface minus that
below is related to the surface current at that interface. If
we take this interface to be where there are conductor
strips, then, J
s
(x)a0, but at other interfaces without
strips, J
s
(x) =0 and tangential H eld continuity occurs.
Equation (33) assures tangential electric eld Econtinuity
at any interface. Equation (34a) enables the nite Fourier
transform, and (34b) constrains the device to be fully
enclosed with actual (or computational) walls, where h
T
is the total vertical structure thickness.
3. GREENS FUNCTION FOR DNM MATERIALS
In the Greens function construction, (29) is impressed on
the system through (32), which creates the eld solution
G(x; y; x
/
) =F
L
d(x x
/
) [ ] (35)
Here the system linear operator F
L
takes the delta func-
tion d(x x
/
) applied in either the ^ xx or ^ zz direction and
determines the eld component responses, making a two-
indexed tensor (dyadic) of size 6 2. Equation (35) im-
plicitly assumes that a single interface has the delta
function source, and this is acceptable because later on
when numerical eld plots are shown, that will be the
situation for the multilayered structures examined. But
there is no reason in principle why this formula cannot be
extended to multiple forcing function interfaces (this has
been done for ordinary media problems in the literature).
Multiplying (35) on the right by J
s
(x
/
) and integrating, and
because F
L
is a linear operator, the current vector along
with the integral operator may be pulled inside it, giving
_
b
b
G(x; y; x
/
)
.
J
s
(x
/
)dx
/
=F
L
_
b
b
J
s
(x
/
)d(x x
/
)dx
/
_ _
(36)
The left-hand side is the eld solution of the problem
F(x,y), and because the argument of the linear operator by
(31) is the total vector surface current, (36) yields
F(x; y) =F
L
J
s
(x) [ ] (37)
Therefore, with knowledge of G(x; y; x
/
), the eld solution
is immediately known:
F(x; y) =
_
b
b
G(x; y; x
/
)
.
J
s
(x
/
)dx
/
(38)
Considering J
s
as a form of a eld, as well as F as a eld,
makes (36) an integral equation of the homogeneous
Fredholm type of the second kind. Neither J
s
nor F is
known. They must be found by solving (38), with the
understanding that the kernel G(x; y; x
/
) can be acquired
before nding the unknowns. Because we will be working
in the spectral domain, the integral equation of problem
(38) must be converted to this domain also. There are
several ways to nd the entire eld solution, and one
effective way, which does not require obtaining the dyadic
Greens function over the whole cross-sectional spatial
domain, utilizes the fact that the strip is a perfect
conductor with
E
t
(x; y) =0 : [x[ow
p
; y =y
I
(39)
A smaller piece of the G must be used, G
xz
EJ
, which relates
the driving surface current to the two tangential electric
eld components. At the y =y
I
interface, (38) is then cast
into the form
E(x; y
I
) =
_
b
b
G
xz
EJ
(x x
/
; y
I
)
.
J
s
(x
/
)dx
/
(40)
Form (40) of the integral equation is a convolution
integral of the kernel and the driving surface current. It
has the wonderful property that transformation into the
spectral domain removes the integral operation. The
solution procedure employed requires us to take a nite
Fourier transform of (40)
_
b
b
E(x) e
ikxx
dx =
_
b
b
e
ikxx
dx
_
b
b
G
xz
EJ
(x x
/
)
.
J
s
(x
/
)dx
/
_ _
=
_
b
b
_
b
b
G
xz
EJ
(x x
/
)e
ikxx
dx
_ _
.
J
s
(x
/
)dx
/
=
_
b
b
_
b
b
G
xz
EJ
(x
/ /
)e
ikx x
/
x
/ /
( )
dx
/ /
_ _
.
J
s
(x
/
)dx
/
=
_
b
b
_
b
b
G
xz
EJ
(x
//
)e
ikxx
/
dx
//
_ _
.
J
s
(x
/
)e
ikxx
/
dx
/
=
_
b
b
G
xz
EJ
(x
/ /
)e
ikxx
/
dx
/ /
_ _
.
_
b
b
J
s
(x
/
)e
ikxx
/
dx
/
_ _
=G
xz
EJ
(k
x
)
.
J
s
(k
x
) (41)
or
E(k
x
) =G
xz
EJ
(k
x
)
.
J
s
(k
x
) (42)
In (41) x
/ /
=x x
/
, dx
/ /
=dx, led to the third step and (11a),
to the nal step. G
xz
EJ
is given by [15]
~
GG
xx
(k
x
; g) =
P
(1)
13
P
(21)
24
P
(2)
14
P
(21)
14
P
(2)
24
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
P
(1)
14
P
(21)
13
P
(2)
24
P
(21)
23
P
(2)
14
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
(43a)
~
GG
xz
(k
x
; g) =
P
(1)
13
P
(21)
24
P
(2)
13
P
(21)
14
P
(2)
23
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
P
(1)
14
P
(21)
13
P
(2)
23
P
(21)
23
P
(2)
13
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
(43b)
~
GG
zx
(k
x
; g) =
P
(1)
23
P
(21)
24
P
(2)
14
P
(21)
14
P
(2)
24
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
P
(1)
24
P
(21)
13
P
(2)
24
P
(21)
23
P
(2)
14
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
(43c)
~
GG
zz
(k
x
; g) =
P
(1)
23
P
(21)
24
P
(2)
13
P
(21)
14
P
(2)
23
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
P
(1)
24
P
(21)
13
P
(2)
23
P
(21)
23
P
(2)
13
_ _
P
(21)
14
P
(21)
23
P
(21)
13
P
(21)
24
(43d)
with
P
(1)
=P
(1)
(h
1
); P
(2)
=P
(2)
(h
2
);
P
(21)
=P
(2)
(h
2
)P
(1)
(h
1
)
(44)
P(y) =e
ioRy
(45)
where h
i
is thickness of the ith layer.
4. ELECTROMAGNETIC FIELDS FOR DNM
Formulas (43) were found utilizing (25), which has a
solution in the ith layer of
F
i
=F(y
i
) =P
(i)
(y
i
)F
i
(h
T;i
) (46)
using the global y coordinate. It is very convenient to
convert to the local coordinates y
/
where for the ith layer
now the local coordinate (h
0
0) is
y
i
/
=y
i
h
T;i
; h
T;i
=
i1
k=0
h
k
(47)
where h
T,i
is the total thickness of all the layers prior to
the ith layer. In the local coordinate system, (46) appears
as
F
i
=F(y
i
/
) =P
(i)
(y
i
/
)F
i
(0) (48)
This equation is applied repeatedly to each layer through-
out the structure, exercising caution to impose (32)(34) in
the spectral domain
^ yy H
(k
x
; y) H
(k
x
; y)
_
=J
s
(k
x
); y =y
I
(49)
E
t
(k
x
; y) =E
t
(k
x
; y); y =h
i
h
T;i
=
i
k =0
h
k
(50)
and boundary conditions
E
x
(k
x
; y) =E
z
(k
x
; y) =0; y =0; h
T
(51)
Boundary conditions on the sidewalls (34a) are converted
to the spectral domain in a process that generates the
discretization of k
x
. The detailed derivation will be given
since the whole technique hinges on it.
By (11b), the spatial electric eld components E
y,z
are
expressed as
E
y; z
(x; y) =
1
2b
o
kx =o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
(52)
Consider rst the case where E
y,z
(x,y) has even symmetry
with respect to the x axis. (Symmetry choices will be
covered in more detail after the derivation of the discre-
tization k
x
values.) For even symmetry, we obtain
E
y; z
(x; y) =E
y; z
(x; y) (53)
Invoking (52), this becomes
1
2b
o
kx =o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
=
1
2b
o
kx =o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
=
1
2b
o
kx = o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
(54a)
1
2b
o
k
x
=o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) E
y;z
(k
x
; y)
_
e
ik
x
x
=0 (54b)
Equation (54b) is valid for any x if the bracketed term is
zero, namely, if
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) =E
y; z
(k
x
; y) (55)
Now we must insert this back into the expansion (52),
obtaining
E
y; z
(x; y) =
1
2b
o
k
x
=o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
=
1
2b
k
x
=o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
E
y; z
(0; y)
1
2b
o
k
x
=0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
=
1
2b
k
x
= o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
E
y; z
(0; y)
1
2b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
=
1
2b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
E
y; z
(0; y)
1
2b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
=
1
2b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) e
ikxx
e
ikxx
_
E
y; z
(0; y)
=
1
b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) cos k
x
x ( ) E
y; z
(0; y) (56)
In (56), Eq. (55) was used for the third step. Imposition of
boundary condition (34a) forces (56) to obey
1
b
o
k
x
=0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) cos k
x
x ( ) E
y; z
(0; y) =0 (57)
or
cos k
x
b ( ) =0; E
y; z
(0; y) =0 (58)
The rst constraint in (57) restricts k
x
to
k
x
=
2n 1
2
p; n=0; 1; 2; (59)
showing that k
x
a0, allowing us to drop the second (57)
constraint. For odd symmetry, we obtain
E
y; z
(x; y) = E
y; z
(x; y) (60)
Invoking (52), this becomes
1
2b
o
k
x
=o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
=
1
2b
o
k
x
=o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
=
1
2b
o
k
x
= o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
(61a)
1
2b
o
k
x
=o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) E
y; z
(k
x
; y)
_
e
ik
x
x
=0 (61b)
Equation (61b) is valid for any x if the bracketed term is
zero, namely, if
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) = E
y; z
(k
x
; y) (62)
Now we must insert this back into the expansion (52),
obtaining
E
y; z
(x; y) =
1
2b
o
kx =o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
=
1
2b
k
x
=o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
E
y; z
(0; y)
1
2b
o
k
x
=0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
=
1
2b
kx = o
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
E
y; z
(0; y)
1
2b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
=
1
2b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ikxx
E
y; z
(0; y)
1
2b
o
k
x
=0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y)e
ik
x
x
1
2b
o
k
x
=0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) e
ik
x
x
e
ik
x
x
_
E
y; z
(0; y)
=
i
b
o
k
x
=0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) sin k
x
x ( ) E
y; z
(0; y) (63)
In (63), Eq. (62) was used in the third step. Imposition of
boundary condition (34a) forces (63) to obey
i
b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) sin k
x
b ( ) E
y; z
(0; y) =0 (64)
or
sin k
x
b ( ) =0; E
y; z
(0; y) =0 (65)
The rst constraint in (65) restricts k
x
to
k
x
=
n
b
p; n=0; 1; 2; (66)
Since the rst constraint allows k
x
=0, technically the rst
summation in (64) does not have n=0 in its domain, but
by widening its domain to cover k
x
=0, the second con-
straint may be dropped; that is, (64) becomes
i
b
o
kx =0
E
y; z
(k
x
; y) sin k
x
b ( ) =0 (67)
and rule (66) is exact.
Next we treat the origin of the symmetry choices. Go to
the harmonic equations (3), and expand them out by
components for the simplest case of isotropic DNM, ob-
taining
@H
z
@y

@H
y
@z
=ioe
DNM
E
x
J
x
;
@H
x
@z

@H
z
@x
=ioe
DNM
E
y
;
@H
y
@x

@H
x
@y
=ioe
DNM
E
z
J
z
(68a)
@E
z
@y

@E
y
@z
= iom
DNM
H
x
;
@E
x
@z

@E
z
@x
= iom
DNM
H
y
;
@E
y
@x

@E
x
@y
= iom
DNM
H
z
(68b)
Setting J
z
(x,y) =even for the impressed current, we nd
that (68a) requires that E
z
(x,y) =even, H
y
(x,y) =odd, and
H
x
(x,y) =even in its third equation; H
z
(x,y) =odd
and E
y
(x,y) =even in its second equation; and E
x
(x,y) =odd
and J
x
(x,y) =odd in its rst equation. These selections are
consistent with (68b). For J
z
(x,y) =odd, all the selections
are reversed. Care must be exercised in this process, and
one can show that for biaxial DNM, where the
"
" ee" ee tensor is
biaxial, the
"
" mm" mm tensor is biaxial, or both, the symmetry
choices still hold. This is the case whether the biaxial
tensors are principle axis and diagonal, or the crystal is
rotated, producing a nondiagonal tensor(s). However, pure
symmetry choices are rarely allowed for nonreciprocal
materials such as materials employing precessional spin
behavior (as in a ceramics with magnetic ions) or cyclotron
carrier motion (as in semiconductors with free electrons or
holes), which require the superposition of the even and
odd symmetry choices.
The surface currents that drive the problem self-con-
sistently can be chosen in a number of ways, as it is
necessary to prepare complete sets only of basis functions
that are used to construct them. They are selected in the
real-space domain to display some advantageous proper-
ties, for example, edge singularity behavior due to charge
repulsion. For the complete set of cosinusoidal basis func-
tions modied by the edge condition, we have for a strip
with even-mode symmetry (determined by the z-compo-
nent symmetry as just discussed above)
J
zm
(x) =x
em
(x) =
cos p
x
w
m1 [ ]
_ _
1 x=w
_ _
2
_ ; x [ [ _ w
0; wo x [ [
_
_
(69a)
J
xm
(x) =Z
em
(x) =
sin p
x
w
m
_ _
1 x=w
_ _
2
_ ; x [ [ _ w
0; wo x [ [
_
_
(69b)
and for odd-mode symmetry
J
zm
(x) =x
om
(x) =
sin
p
2
x
w
2m1 [ ]
_ _
1 x=w
_ _
2
_ ; x [ [ _ w
0; wo x [ [
_
_
(70a)
J
xm
(x) =Z
om
(x) =
cos
p
2
x
w
2m1 [ ]
_ _
1 x=w
_ _
2
_ ; x [ [ _ w
0; wo x [ [
_
_
(70b)
Superposition of the complete set forms the total surface
current [and constitutes the method of moments (MoM)
when unknown currents or elds are expanded using
basis sets and inner products with weights taken on the
structure-governing equation to derive a linear system to
be solved]:
J
x;e
(x) =
n
x
m=1
a
e;m
Z
e;m
(x); J
z;e
(x) =
n
z
m=1
b
e;m
x
e;m
(x) (71a)
J
x;o
(x) =
n
x
m=1
a
o;m
Z
o;m
(x); J
z;o
(x) =
n
z
m=1
b
o;m
x
o;m
(x) (71b)
Fourier transforming (71) according to (11a) gives
J
x;e
(n) =
nx
m=1
a
e;m
Z
e;m
(n);
J
z;e
(n) =
n
z
m=1
b
e;m
x
e;m
(n)
(72a)
J
x;o
(n) =
n
x
m=1
a
o;m
Z
o;m
(n);
J
z;o
(n) =
n
z
m=1
b
o;m
x
o;m
(n)
(72b)
with
x
e;m
n ( ) =x
e;m
k
x
n [ ] ( ) =
pw
2
{J
0
k
x
w m1 [ ]p ( )
J
0
k
x
w m1 [ ]p ( )]
(73a)
Z
e;m
n ( ) =Z
e;m
k
x
n [ ] ( ) =
ipw
2
{J
0
k
x
wmp ( )
J
0
k
x
wmp ( )]
(73b)
x
o;m
n ( ) =x
o;m
k
x
n [ ] ( ) =
ipw
2
J
0
k
x
w 2m1 [ ]
p
2
_ _ _
J
0
k
x
w 2m1 [ ]
p
2
_ __
(74a)
Z
o;m
n ( ) =Z
o;m
k
x
n [ ] ( ) =
pw
2
J
0
k
x
w 2m1 [ ]
p
2
_ _ _
J
0
k
x
w 2m1 [ ]
p
2
_ _
(74b)
An exact solution is obtained only when n
x
and n
z
-N.
However, a nite number of them may be used, depending
on the propagating eigenmode modeled, to nd a reason-
ably accurate numerical result. In (73) and (74), J
0
denotes the Bessel function of the rst kind.
Eigenvalues g and eigenvectors of the propagating
problem can now be found from (42), the interfacial strip
equation (drop all interfacial indexes, and use subscripts
to label elements)
E
x
(n; g) =G
xx
(g; n)J
x
(n; g) G
xz
(g; n)J
z
(n; g)
E
z
(n; g) =G
zx
(g; n)J
x
(n; g) G
zz
(g; n)J
z
(n; g)
(75)
by substituting for the surface currents using expression
(72a) or (72b) depending on the mode symmetry to be
studied (we drop the explicit mode symmetry type nota-
tion since we will treat only one or the other type of pure
symmetry solution here):
E
x
(n; g) =G
xx
(g; n)
nx
i =1
a
i
Z
i
(n) G
xz
(g; n)
nz
i =1
b
i
x
i
(n)
E
z
(n; g) =G
zx
(g; n)
n
x
i =1
a
i
Z
i
(n) G
zz
(g; n)
n
z
i =1
b
i
x
i
(n)
(76)
Next multiply the rst equation of (76) by Z
j
and the
second by x
j
, then summing over the spectral index n (this
is the inner product part of the MoM method)
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)E
x
(n; g) =
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xx
(g; n)
n
x
i =1
a
i
(n)Z
i
(n)
_ _
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xz
(g; n)
n
z
i =1
b
i
(n)x
i
(n)
_ _
o
n=o
x
j
(n)E
z
(n; g) =
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zx
(g; n)
n
x
i =1
a
i
(n)Z
i
(n)
_ _
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zz
(g; n)
nz
i =1
b
i
(n)x
i
(n)
_ _
(77)
Interchanging the order of the basis function and spectral
summations in (77), we obtain
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)E
x
(n; g) =
n
x
i =1
a
i
(n)
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xx
(g; n)Z
i
(n)
_ _
n
z
i =1
b
i
(n)
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xz
(g; n)x
i
(n)
_ _
o
n=o
x
j
(n)E
z
(n; g) =
n
x
i =1
a
i
(n)
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zx
(g; n)Z
i
(n)
_ _
nz
i =1
b
i
(n)
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zz
(g; n)x
i
(n)
_ _
(78)
Examine the left-hand sides of this paired set of equations
(78):
1 1
1 1
_
_
_
_

o
n=o
Z
e;o;j
x
e;o;j
_
_
_
_
_
_
(n)E
x; z
(n; g)
=
o
n=o
Z
+
j
x
+
j
_
_
_
_
(n)E
x; z
(n; g)
=
o
n=o
_
b
b
Z
j
x
j
_
_
_
_
_
_
(x)e
ik
x
x
dx
_
_
_
_
+
E
x; z
(n; g)
=
o
n=o
_
b
b
Z
+
j
x
+
j
_
_
_
_
(x)e
ik
x
x
dxE
x; z
(n; g)
=
o
n=o
_
b
b
Z
j
x
j
_
_
_
_
_
_
(x)e
ik
x
x
dxE
x; z
(n; g)
=
_
b
b
Z
j
x
j
_
_
_
_
_
_
(x)
o
n=o
E
x; z
(n; g)e
ik
x
x
_ _
dx
=2b
_
b
b
Z
j
x
j
_
_
_
_
_
_
(x)E
x; z
(x; g)dx
=0
(79)
where the rst and second rows in the left-hand side
matrix correspond, respectively, to even and odd symme-
try. Right-hand equalities in the rst, second, fourth,
sixth, and last lines used, respectively, (73) and (74),
(11a), (69) and (70), (11b), and (40) with (69) and (70).
Equation (79) amounts to a Parseval theorem [16] for the
problem at hand. Enlisting this theorem, we can rewrite
(78) as
nx
i =1
a
i
(n)
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xx
(g; n)Z
i
(n)
_ _
n
z
i =1
b
i
(n)
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xz
(g; n)x
i
(n)
_ _
=0
n
x
i =1
a
i
(n)
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zx
(g; n)Z
i
(n)
_ _
n
z
i =1
b
i
(n)
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zz
(g; n)x
i
(n)
_ _
=0
(80)
Since (80) is valid for any jth basis test function, it may be
condensed into the form
n
x
i =1
a
i
(n)X
ji
xx
(g)
n
z
i =1
b
i
(n)X
ji
xz
(g) =0; j =1; 2; . . . ; n
x
nx
i =1
a
i
(n)X
ji
zx
(g)
nz
i =1
b
i
(n)X
ji
zz
(g) =0; j =1; 2; . . . ; n
z
(81)
where (this is referred to as the Galerkin technique since
{Z
i
, x
i
} ={Z
j
, x
j
})
X
ji
xx
(g) =
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xx
(g; n)Z
i
(n)
X
ji
xz
(g) =
o
n=o
Z
j
(n)G
xz
(g; n)x
i
(n)
X
ji
zx
(g) =
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zx
(g; n)Z
i
(n)
X
ji
zz
(g) =
o
n=o
x
j
(n)G
zz
(g; n)x
i
(n)
(82)
In matrix form, (81) appears as
X
xx
X
xz
X
zx
X
zz
_
_
_
_
a
b
_
_
_
_
=0; X
a
b
_
_
_
_
=0; Xv=0
X=
X
xx
X
xz
X
zx
X
zz
_
_
_
_
; v=
a
b
_
_
_
_
(83)
Once system of equations (83) is solved, then vector v
containing the coefcients needed to construct the surface
current, and from them the electromagnetic eld, is
known, which is the problem eigenvector. The eigenvalue
g is determined from this system also (from the determi-
nant of X set to zero). From (72), the total vector surface
current is obtained:
J(x; y) =
1
2b
n
max
n=n
max
J(n; y)e
ia
n
x
(84)
Once the total surface current is available, the total
eigenvector eld solution follows from G
xz
EJ
(x x
/
; y
I
) in
(40) [17]:
E(x; y) =
1
2b
n
max
n=nmax
E(n; y)e
ianx
;
H(x; y) =
1
2b
nmax
n=n
max
H(n; y)e
ia
n
x
(85)
Spectral expansion is truncated at the same maximum
number of terms n=n
max
for all vector components. Basis
function summation limits n
x
and n
z
for the x and z
components (m=m
max
) [see (72) for the surface current
expansion] can be truncated at different values. Current
and elds are real physical quantities, so they must be
converted through
J
p
(x; y; z) =Re J(x; y)e
iotgz
_
;
E
p
(x; y; z) =Re E(x; y)e
iotgz
_
;
H
p
(x; y; z) =Re H(x; y)e
iotgz
_
(86)
which reasserts both the time and z dependence down the
guiding structure. At a particular z plane, say, z =0, we
may drop the explicit z dependence. And if we dont wish to
watch the time evolution of the harmonic wave, which is
sufcient for plotting purposes, we may further set t =0,
and write (86) as
J
p
(x; y) =Re J(x; y) [ ];
E
p
(x; y) =Re E(x; y) [ ];
H
p
(x; y) =Re H(x; y) [ ]
(87)
5. NUMERICAL DETERMINATION OF THE FIELDS
FOR DNM
Let us, for the sake of discussion, consider a possible use of
DNM or LHM in a combination structure as in Fig. 6,
which could indicate where the future may lie with such
materials under appropriate development. Figure 6a is a
Ferroelectric
Ferrite
Left-Handed Medium
Air
Left-Handed Medium
100 m-thick YIG
Metallization
(a) (b)
Metal
1 m-thick Ba
0.6
Sr
0.4
TiO
3
Figure 6. (a) Cross section of a multilayered
coplanar structure possessing a ferroelectric
material, a ferromagnetic material, and a
DNM or LHM; (b) perspective drawing of the
structure with possible substances and thick-
nesses for ferroelectric and ferromagnetic ma-
terials. (This gure is available in full color at
http://www.mrw.interscience.wiley.com/erfme.)
cross-sectional view of metallization in what is commonly
referred to as a coplanar microstrip pattern. The electric
elds go from the inner metal strip to the edges of the
wider strips of metal. The wider strips attach to the metal
enclosure and so act as ground planes on the surface
between the layers of materials and the air above them.
The RFelectric eld tends to go from the inner strip to the
outer ground planes. Because the elds are close to the
ferroelectricair interface using this metallization pat-
tern, control of the ferroelectric materials properties
using a static DC voltage bias between the strip and the
ground planes allows control component capabilities. In
particular, the static DC voltage bias will change the
ferroelectric materials dielectric constant, which will
affect the RF propagation. Below the ferroelectric layer
is a layer of ferromagnetic material that can be controlled
with a static magnetic eld bias. The ferromagnetic
materials magnetic properties, through its permeability
tensor, are altered by changing the magnetic eld bias.
Finally, on the bottom is the DNM or LHM, which allows
one to change the eld line patterns of the prior two
layers, thereby adding a further degree of design capabil-
ity to the structures RF performance. Because device
impedance varies as Z=
m
eff
=e
eff
_
, where m
eff
and e
eff
respectively are the effective permeability and permittiv-
ity of the device structure, we may express the impedance
as Z=
m
eff
(fm)=e
eff
(fe)
_
[DNM], which serves to indicate
where the major effect of each material is. Clearly, the
DNM affects the whole eld pattern, and that is why it is
to the right of the radical sign, altering the eld patterns
in both ferroelectric and ferromagnetic materials. Figure
6b shows a topside view of the same structure, with some
specic possible materials labeled for the ferroelectric and
ferromagnetic substances. Although this structure has
been neither built nor modeled, it shows where the
research and development could go in the future. How-
ever, an experimental structure containing a ferroelectric
layer and a ferromagnetic layer was fabricated and tested
in 2000 [18].
Before examining a structure compatible with inte-
grated planar circuit technology, the material will be
made less general and complex by eliminating the optical
activities (magnetoelectric coefcients) in Section 2. Then
the factors needed to reconstruct the y components of the
transverse electric E
y
and magnetic H
y
elds become
D
a
=e
22
m
22
, a
21
/
= e
21
m
22
, a
23
/
= e
23
m
22
, a
24
/
=m
22
ig=o,
a
26
/
= m
22
k
x
=o, a
51
/
= e
22
ig=o, a
53
/
=e
22
k
x
=o, a
54
/
=
e
22
m
21
, and a
56
/
= e
22
Z
23
. One notices that the rst
two factors contain off-diagonal constitutive permittivity
tensor elements, the next four contain only diagonal
constitutive tensor elements, and the last two contain
off-diagonal constitutive permeability tensor elements.
Because the discussion below will be limited to biaxial
electric and magnetic crystals utilized in the principal
axis system, off-diagonal-element-dependent factors will
become null, making a
21
/
=0, a
23
/
=0, a
54
/
=0, and
a
56
/
=0.
Since microstrip is one of the fundamental building
blocks of RF hybrid and integrated circuits, actual nu-
merically determined results will be shown for a structure
with a single substrate material, that of a DNM or LHM,
and a single microstrip conductor strip. The structure to
be modeled is shown in Fig. 7. Figure 7a shows a cross-
sectional view, indicating that the device is surrounded by
a perfect conducting wall (electric wall), and Fig. 7b shows
a perspective view without the obstruction of the enclo-
sure walls. The enclosure walls can be thought of as a
computational vehicle for using the numerical procedure
described in Sections 24, even if the actual device is not
inside a conductor box. Since, in general, the LHM or
DNM can be anisotropic, the permittivity and permeabil-
ity of the material are characterized by tensors
"
" ee" ee and
"
" mm" mm (or
[e] and [m] in the gure). For our actual DNM study device,
however, isotropy will be assumed, making
"
" ee" ee =eI and
"
" mm" mm =mI, where I =identity tensor. Because the material is
DNM,
"
" ee" ee =eI = e [ [I and
"
" mm" mm =mI = m
I, where e [ [ =e
m;r
e
0
and m
=m
m;r
m
0
. Here the subscript r denotes relative
values to free space, where e
0
and m
0
are the free-space
values of, respectively, the permittivity and permeability.
Substrate relative permittivity and permeability magni-
tude values are set to e
m;r
=2:5 and m
m;r
=2:5. Structure
dimensions are height h
T
=5.5 mm, substrate thickness
Left-Handed Medium
Air
Microstrip metal
[ ] [ ]
Electric wall
enclosure
S
t
r
i
p
M
e
t
a
l
l
i
z
a
t
i
o
n
LHM
Ground Plane
(a) (b)

Figure 7. (a) Single microstrip structure using a
DNM or LHM substratea perfect conductor
(electric wall) encloses the device; (b) perspective
drawing of the structure, without the encum-
brance of the enclosing walls. (This gure
is available in full color at http://www.mrw.
h
s
=0.5mm, air region thickness h
a
=5 mm, box width
B=2b =5mm, and strip width w
s
=2w=0.5mm.
Figure 8 shows the electric eld magnitude E=|E| in
a color scale plot with the color scale shown below the
gure at the frequency of 5 GHz. (This gure and the
others to follow, including the associated propagation
constants g, were obtained using n
x
=n
z
=1 number of
surface current basis functions, n=200 Fourier terms,
and over 8000 gridpoints for magnitude plots from a
computer code. A larger number of n
x
, n
z
, and n have
been examined for plots and propagation constants, but
are not discussed here [4,19].) It is a linear scale. Strip
location is indicated by a solid dark line at y =0.5 mm, x =
70.25 mm. Overlaid on the magnitude plot is a line
drawing of E vector shown in white lines. Electric eld
direction is also noted by the arrows attached to the lines.
The next gure (Fig. 9) shows the magnetic eld magni-
tude H=|H| in a color scale plot with the color scale
again shown below the gure. Once again a line drawing
of H vector is overlaid in white lines on top of the
magnitude plot, with H-eld direction indicated by the
arrows attached to the lines. In Figs. 9 and 10, we have
shown only a limited number of eld lines, since in
principle one can draw an innite number of them. In
addition, for the electric eld lines, we have drawn lines
only from the strip, although electric eld lines exist
elsewhere in the device cross section. Figure 10 extracts
from Figs. 9 and 10 the eld lines in order to observe them
better. Electric eld emanation from the strip conductor in
terms of the orientation of its vector depends on how the
charge resides on the strip, and will vary depending on the
mode propagating. Magnetic eld-line circulation around
the strip conductor is contrary to what one normally
expects for ordinary materials. For ordinary materials,
the circulation would be either clockwise or counterclock-
wise, depending on whether the current was owing,
X (mm)
Y

(
m
m
)
2500 5000 7500 10000 12500 0
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
3.0
3.5
4.0
4.5
5.0
5.5
2.5 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5
Figure 8. Magnitude plot of electric eld E with an overlay of
electric eld lines of the E vector is shown for the structure of
Fig. 7 at 5 GHz. (This gure is available in full color at http://
X (mm)
Y

(
m
m
)
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
3.0
3.5
4.0
4.5
5.0
5.5
2.5 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5
0 5 10 15 20
Figure 9. Magnitude plot of magnetic eld H with an overlay of
magnetic eld lines of the H vector is shown for the structure of
Fig. 7 at 5 GHz. (This gure is available in full color at http://
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
3.0
3.5
4.0
4.5
5.0
5.5
2.5 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5
Y

(
m
m
)
X (mm)
Figure 10. Electric Eand magnetic Held lines for the structure
of Fig. 7 at 5GHz. (This gure is available in full color at http://
respectively, out of or into the paper. But for DNM or LHM
in the structure, the behavior changes, as clearly evi-
denced in Fig. 10.
The propagation constant for the structure at 5 GHz
turns out to be entirely real, that is, g =a ib=ib, where a
is the attenuation constant and b is the phase propagation
constant, the same quantity that was denoted k in Section 1.
Its value at 5GHz is b=2.22663 (relative to the free-space
value), and gives the phase behavior in the z direction,
perpendicular to the structure cross section. To provide a
comparison to other frequencies for this structure, its
value at 10 GHz becomes complex and is g =a ib =
0.939414 i2.13414 [17,20]. At 40 GHz it is still complex,
(g =1.01830 i1.33370 [17,20]) and at 80GHz, it reverts
again to being purely a phase, but with two lowest-order
fundamental solutions, b =1.17765 and b=1.78861. Com-
plex g values at the intermediate millimeter wavelength
frequencies mean that the wave is evanescing, or decaying
as the wave propagates down the structure. For a - b, it
will not take many wavelengths of distance down the
guiding structure for the wave to be completely attenu-
ated. However, such wave reduction amplitude control can
provide the basis for ltering functions. Now let us return
to the discussion of eld plots.
For a comparison to an ordinary media structure,
Fig. 11 shows the E-eld magnitude and an overlaid arrow
plot giving the electric eld vector E (arrow length gives
the magnitude, while its orientation indicates its direction)
at 15GHz for a somewhat anisotropic device. Its dimen-
sions are total height h
T
=4.5mm, substrate thickness h
s
=1.5mm, air region thickness h
a
=3mm, box width B=
2b=8.5mm, and strip width w
s
=2w=1.5mm. The mate-
rial is pyrolitic boron nitride with diagonal permittivity
tensor elements e
xx
=e
zz
=5.12 and e
yy
=3.4. The crystal is
oriented so that the structure coordinates and the princi-
pal crystal axes match. Although the materials permit-
tivity anisotropy is 33.6% referenced to the dominant
diagonal elements, the overall eld behavior is indicative
of a normal media structure, enough to enable us to
compare it to our demonstration DNM device. Note how
the majority of the eld magnitude is below the interface.
This structures propagation constant g =1.77882.
This is not the case for our demonstration LHM device,
numerically evaluated at 10 GHz and shown in Fig. 12 for
the electric E eld. Much of the eld is above the interface
and to the sides of the strip. Figure 13 shows the magnetic
H eld. This gure seems remarkable because the eld
appears large away from the strip. The ability of the
4 3 2 1 0 1 2 3 4
500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000
x (mm)
y

(
m
m
)

4
3
2
1
0
0
Figure 11. Electric eld magnitude E and an
overlaid arrow plot giving the electric eld vector
E at 15GHz for a ordinary media structure.
(This gure is available in full color at http://
2 1 0 1 2
200 400 600 800 1000 1200
5
4
3
2
1
0

Y

(
m
m
)
X (mm)
0
Figure 12. Magnitude plot of the electric eld E, with an over-
laid arrow plot giving the electric eld vector E, is shown for the
structure of Fig. 7 at 10 GHz. (This gure is available in full color
at http://www.mrw.interscience.wiley.com/erfme.)
LHM-RHM combination structure to expel the eld from
the usual regions it is found in and to place it in other
regions signals its potential application toward recongur-
ing elds in ordinary devices and designing completely
new devices.
6. CONCLUSION
There are many fascinating aspects of double-negative
materials (DNM) or left-handed materials (LHM) in rela-
tion to their physics in guided-wave structures. Likewise,
the electronic aspects of using DNM or LHM as substrates
based on the new physics of this material could lead to
many new devices, modied old ones with additional
functionality, or improved old devices. Many microwave
components come to mind that could be affected by the use
of this new DNM, including transmission lines [21], phase
shifters, couplers, power dividers, isolators, circulators,
and lters, to name just a few.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. For the interested reader seeking more information on focus-
ing and radiating research done using LHM, there are many
excellent places to look, including the journals Physical Re-
viewB and E, Physical ReviewLetters, and Journal of Applied
Physics since 1998; sessions of the June 2003 CLEO/QELS-
Conference on Left Handed Materials, session on Optics of
Negative Index and Left-Handed Materials at the March
2003 American Physical Society Meeting [in the APS Bulletin
48, (1), (Part I)]; online April 2003 issue of Optics Express
(Optical Society of America), special Oct. 2003 issue of the
journal IEEE Transactions of Antennas and Propagation
51(10) on metamaterials; sessions at the June 2003 IEEE
MTT-S International Microwave Symposium on Negative
Refractive Index Materials and Applications and on Negative
Index Materials and Microwave Applications (Vol. 1 of the
Digest), and in the 2002 book Advances in Electromagnetics of
Complex Media and Metamaterials, Part II on metamaterials
with negative parameters (and in Parts I and III on related
subjects).
2. V. G. Veselago, The electrodynamics of substances with
simultaneous negative values of e and m, Soviet Phys. USPE-
KHI 10(4):509514 (Jan.Feb. 1968).
3. J. F. Gittins, Power Travelling-Wave Tubes, American Else-
vier, New York, 1965.
4. H. R. Johnson, Backward wave oscillators, Proc. IRE 684697
(1955).
5. M. S. Sodha and N. C. Srivastava, Microwave Propagation in
Ferrimagnetics, Plenum Press, New York, 1981.
6. C. M. Krowne, Physics of propagation in left-handed guided
wave structures at microwave and millimeter wave frequen-
cies, Phys. Rev. Lett. 92(5) 053901, (Feb. 3, 2004); also online
at Cornell Univ. Archive arXiv.org/abs/physics/0305004,
May 5, 2003.
7. C. Caloz and T. Itoh, Novel microwave devices and structures
based on the transmission line approach of meta-materials,
IEEE MTT-S Int. Microwave Symp. Digest, June 2003, Vol. 1,
pp. 195198.
8. C. M. Krowne and R. E. Neidert, Theory and numerical
calculations for radially inhomogeneous circular ferrite cir-
culators, IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech. 44(3): 419431
(March 1996).
9. C. M. Krowne, M. Daniel, S. W. Kirchoefer, and J. M. Pond,
Anisotropic permittivity and attenuation extraction from
phase propagation measurements using an anisotropic full-
wave Greens function solver for coplanar ferroelectric thin
lm devices, IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech. 50(2):
537548 (Feb. 2002).
10. S. Ramo, J. R. Whinnery, and T. Van Duzer, Fields and Waves
in Communication Electronics, Wiley, New York, 1967.
11. L. Brillouin, Wave Propagation in Periodic Structures, Dover,
New York, 1953.
12. R. A. Shelby, D. R. Smith, and S. Schultz, Experimental
verication of a negative index of refraction, Science
292:7779 (2001).
13. A. Lakhtakia and C. M. Krowne, Restricted equivalence of
paired epsilon-negative and mu-negative layers to a negative
phase-velocity material (alias left-handed material), Optik
114(7): 305307 (2003); also online at Cornell Univ. arXiv,
physics/0308043, Aug. 11, 2003.
14. C. M. Krowne, Fourier transformed matrix method of nding
propagation characteristics of complex anisotropic layered
media, IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech. 32(12):1617
1625 (Dec. 1984).
15. A. A. Mostafa, C. M. Krowne, and K. A. Zaki, Numerical
spectral matrix method for propagation in general layered
media: Application to isotropic and anisotropic substrates,
IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech. 35(12):13991407 (Dec.
1987).
16. C. M. Krowne, A. A. Mostafa, and K. A. Zaki, Slot and
microstrip guiding structures using magnetoplasmons for
nonreciprocal millimeter wave propagation, IEEE Trans.
Microwave Theory Tech. 36:18501860 (Dec. 1988).
2 1 0 1 2
0.25 0.50 0.75 1.00 1.25 1.50
5
4
3
2
1
0
Y

(
m
m
)
X (mm)
0
Figure 13. Magnitude plot of the magnetic eld H, with an
overlaid arrow plot giving the magnetic eld vector H, is shown
for the structure of Fig. 7 at 10GHz. (This gure is available in
17. C. M. Krowne, Electromagnetic eld theory and numerically
generated results for propagation in left-handed guided wave
single microstrip structures, IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory
Tech. 51(12):22692283 (Dec. 2003).
18. S. W. Kirchoefer, J. M. Pond, H. S. Newman, W.-J. Kim, and
J. S. Horowitz, Ferroelectric-ferrite tunable phase shifters,
IEEE MTT-S Int. Microwave Symp. Digest, June 2000, Vol. 3,
pp. 13591362.
19. C. M. Krowne, Physics and electronics of left-handed guided
wave devices, American Physical Society March 2003 Meet-
ing, Session K22, Paper 12; in APS Bull. 48(1)(Part I): 580
(March 4, 2003).
20. C. M. Krowne and M. Daniel, Electronic aspects of propaga-
tion in left-handed guided wave structures: Electromagnetic-
media interactions, IEEE Int. Microwave Symp. Digest, June
2003, pp. 309312.
21. D. R. Jachowski and C. M. Krowne, Frequency dependence of
left-handed and right-handed periodic transmission lines,
IEEE Int. Microwave Symp. Digest, June 2004, Vol. 3, pp.
18311834.
LENS ANTENNAS
J. A. G. MALHERBE
University of Pretoria
Pretoria, South Africa
1. LENSES AS ANTENNAS
There are certain, very specic reasons why a lens an-
tenna would be chosen for a given application, and also
very specic disadvantages associated with it. They have
high directivity and low sidelobe patterns. Lenses are fed
from the rear, and consequently there is no aperture
blockage. Furthermore, they can be designed to have a
minimum of aberrations for off-axis operation, and are
therefore ideally suited to multibeam applications. In
some instances, extremely wide scan angles can be
achieved. Two-dimensional scanning lenses are well sui-
ted in application as linefeeds for cylindrical parabolic
reectors for scanning in a single plane.
At the same time, lenses suffer from internal dielectric
losses, as well as reection losses at the surface interfaces.
They are often bulky, and have to be mounted by the edges
of the antenna. But this disadvantage is a result of the
advantage that they have no aperture blockage. These
disadvantages are not typical of, for instance, reector
antennas. In spite of the disadvantages, the positive
properties of lens antennas make that they are the chosen
solution especially where wide scan angles are needed. At
the higher microwave and millimeterwave frequencies,
size ceases to be a major consideration in the application of
lenses.
1.1. Optics and Dielectrics
The electromagnetic spectrum extends from the very low
radiofrequencies through the microwave and millimeter-
wave frequencies to beyond the visible spectrum of light.
All of these wave phenomena can be described by the same
set of wave equations, and there is no reason why the
principles applicable to optics cannot be extended down-
ward to cover the RFmicrowave spectrum. Together with
the physical principles and theory, follows devices result-
ing from the application of the theoretical principles.
Lenses that make use of the refractive phenomena
associated with wave motion can be used to collimate
electromagnetic radiation in exactly the same way as
they do in optical systems.
In optical systems, extensive use is made of the prin-
ciples of geometrical optics, where propagation is repre-
sented as taking place along a straight line or ray, and the
same principles will be applied in understanding electro-
magnetic lenses in the RF and microwave areas. The
principles of reection, refraction, and diffraction are
central to the development of lens antennas, although
the latter lies beyond the scope of this article.
Two important principles of optics are basic to lens
action:
1. The propagation (phase) velocity for wave propaga-
tion differs between various media with different
relative permittivity. The relative permittivity is
directly related to the refractive index of the mate-
rial, n=e
r
1/2
. The index of refraction for natural
homogeneous dielectric materials, is always n41.
It varies from about just over 1 for foam-type plastic
dielectrics to between 2 and 4 for plastics, through a
wide range from 2 to 80 for mixtures that contain
various ceramics.
2. When rays are obliquely incident on the interface
between two media, the wave is partially reected,
and partially refracted. Refraction takes place as
shown in Fig. 1. Rays will be refracted towards the
surface normal PP
/
at oblique incidence when tra-
veling from a less to a more dense material, and vice
versa. This is known as Snells law; it sets the
relationship between the angles of incidence and
refraction for known values of n. Snells law is stated
as
sin j
i
=n sin j
t
(1)
y
x
z
i
t
i y
x
z
P P
Medium I Medium I
Medium II
n > 1
Medium II
n < 1
(a) (b)
Figure 1. Refraction at an interface between two media.
2320 LENS ANTENNAS
The statement on natural dielectrics needs expansion.
Clearly, most of the materials mentioned, are not natural
materials in the true sense of the word, but they perform
in the same way as natural materials, so we will use the
term. There are also a large number of other, constructed
and articial media, for which no1. Figure 2a, shows a
plane wave incident on the interface between free space
and a set of parallel conducting plates, with the E eld
parallel to the plates. Providing that the plate separation
lies between l and l/2 of the free-space wave, a single
mode, the transverse electric (TE) mode, will propagate,
with a phase velocity larger than that of light in free
space.
In effect, this constitutes a medium with no1, and can
be used to construct a lens. If the wave is not polarized
with the E-eld parallel to the plates, as in Fig. 2b, the
wave will propagate between the plates in the transverse
electromagnetic (TEM) mode, which has the same phase
velocity as free space. This is clearly not useful. In the rst
case, Snells law is obeyed.
In cases where the wave has a component of velocity
normal to the conducting plates, as depicted in Figs. 2c
and 2d, the behaviour of the wave in the xy plane is as
described above. In the xz plane, though, the wave is
forced to propagate between the parallel plates. This is
termed a constrained wave. In this plane, Snells law is not
obeyed.
Waveguides also exhibit the property of a phase velo-
city different from that of free space. By closely packing
waveguides of particular cross section, a synthetic
material is created that will have a controlled value of n,
and can be applied to the construction of lens antennas. In
fact, any device or medium that can be employed to control
the phase of a wave over a surface, can be applied as an
articial dielectric medium. In a later section we shall see
that even coaxial transmission lines can be applied for this
purpose.
A number of synthetic dielectrics have also been devel-
oped. They consist variously of plastic bases that have
been impregnated with regular lattices of metal spheres,
wires, and strips of various cross sections. In some in-
stances, the inclusions are dielectric spheres, or voids such
as holes.
In the interest of clarity, we shall discern between
natural dielectrics when the refractive index n41, and
articial dielectrics if no1. Synthetic dielectrics will not
be treated as examples, and the above denitions will
sufce.
1.2. Single-Surface Dielectric Lens
The function of a lens antenna is to collimate all energy
radiated from a source. Traveling from the source, all
electrical paths to the lens aperture must be of the same
length for the rays to add constructively.
In Fig. 3a, the simplest lens is illustrated, where one
surface has been chosen to be plane, and the refractive
index is n41. The electrical pathlength of a ray traveling
the path FPP
/
must be the same for P anywhere on the
lens surface. Refraction occurs only at the curved surface
P, and the rays exit in a direction normal to the plane
surface of the lens at P
/
. The body that satises this
condition is readily described mathematically, and it turns
out that the curved surface of the lens a hyperbola, with
the focus at the origin [1]. Inspection of Fig. 3a leads to the
conclusion that the lens can be gainfully increased in size
only until the angle subtended by the lens approximates
the asymptotes of the hyperbola, and this limits the
practical size of the lens.
Because no refraction occurs at plane P
/
, such lenses
are termed single-surface. Note that the position of the
plane at P
/
does not enter into any equation, and we are
free to make the lens as thick as we like (not that that
would be of any advantage). The point being that the lens
y
x
z
x
z
x
z
x
z
y
x
z
x
z
(a) (b)
(c) (d)
Figure 2. Electromagnetic wave passing through parallel con-
ducting planes: (a, b): Incidence parallel to the plane of the
conductors for an E eld polarized parallel and normal to the
conductors, respectively; (c,d) incidence at an angle to the con-
ductors.
P
F
P
f
(x,y)
x
y
a
d
Q
P (x
2
, y
2
)
F
1
y
x
d

a
f
2
P
Q
(a) (b)
Figure 3. (a) Single-surface dielectric lens with one at surface;
(b) lens with circular arc surface n41.
LENS ANTENNAS 2321
in effect collimates radiation from a less to a denser
medium.
An alternative single-surface lens is shown in Fig. 3b.
Here the surface P
/
is chosen to describe an arc of a circle;
thus, P
/
is an equiphase surface with radius r
1
, and no
refraction occurs there, because incidence is normal to the
surface. Once again, we are free to choose the radius as
large or as small as we like, because no refraction occurs,
and any additional path in the dielectric material is
common to all rays. In fact, we may choose the radius to
be so small that F lies within the dielectric, and an
observer to the right of P will not be able to determine
whether F lies in free space, or whether the body to the left
of P
/
is also immersed in the dielectric. For the waves
arriving at QQ
/
to be in phase across the surface, the
electrical pathlength P
/
PQ must be constant. The solution
is once again readily found to be that the curve P
/
must be
described by an ellipse, with the focus of the lens at the
focal point of the ellipse farthest from QQ
/
. This lens is the
complement of the planoconvex lens described above. It
collimates radiation from a dense to a less dense medium.
In Section 1.1, parallel plates and waveguides as
synthetic dielectrics were discussed. Bearing in mind the
fact that for these cases the index of refraction, no1, the
wave travels in effect from a more to a less dense material
if we keep one surface plane (equiphase). It should there-
fore not come as a surprise to nd that the locus of points
describing a parallel-plate lens with one equiphase sur-
face, is an ellipse, as shown in Fig. 4. Note that Snells law
is automatically satised in the case of all single-surface
lenses.
1.3. Zoned Lenses
The lenses described above present a problem, insofar as
that for the practical ranges of refractive index, they are
going to be extremely bulky. In order to alleviate both the
bulkiness and the dissipation loss through the lens asso-
ciated with it, the surface of the lens can be zoned, that is,
subdivided into sections for which the electrical path-
length through each section, is equal within a wavelength
(or integral number of wavelengths). Waves that travel an
integral number of wavelengths further or less, will, of
course, combine in phase with each other. This is achieved
if the steps are equal to l/(n1). This is shown in Fig. 5a
for zoning on the at surface of a natural dielectric lens,
and in Fig. 5b, where the curved surface of the same lens
has been zoned. Zoning for an articial dielectric lens is
shown in Fig. 5c.
In the latter case, each zone is a section of a different
ellipse, because as the zoned sections are stepped, the
focal distance changes. The zoning exercise is therefore
not a simple geometric shift of the lens surface, but a
separate lens design for each zone. Fortunately, the
mathematics is not complicated, and is given in the next
section. Note that this is a frequency-dependent solution,
and zoning immediately restricts the useful bandwidth of
the antenna.
1.4. Lenses with Two Refracting Surfaces
If the lens has two refracting surfaces (neither of which is
equiphase), not only does the equal electrical length
a
d
x
y
F
f
Figure 4. Single-surface lens, with no1, as for parallel-plate
waveguide lenses.
/(n 1)
x
y
y
f
1
x
(x, y)
d
K = 1
K = 2
K = 3
y
K = 1, 2, 3
f
1
x
d
(x, y)
(a)
(c)
(b)
Figure 5. Single-surface lens, n41, zoned on the planar side (a)
and on the convex side (b); articial dielectric lens with no1 (c).
2322 LENS ANTENNAS
condition need to be satised, but also Snells law, at each
of the refracting surfaces. In the mathematical analysis
for such lenses, it will be found that there are more
variables than equations, and it becomes necessary to
make assumptions to obtain solutions.
In the lens in Fig. 6a, one of the surfaces has been xed
as planar. This immediately removes one degree of free-
dom, causing a unique solution to exist, in spite of the fact
that also Snells law needs to be satised at both surfaces.
The zoned version of the same lens is shown in Fig. 6b.
In all other instances (where both surfaces are free, as in
Fig. 6c), it is found that there is no unique solution for the
surfaces, and a practical design involves choices deter-
mined by other considerations [2]. Specic design proce-
dures are discussed in a later section.
1.5. Three-Dimensional Lenses
Up to this point, the lenses studied were described by ray
optics and were two-dimensional. In practice, three-di-
mensional structures are needed, often with specic prop-
erties in orthogonal planes. Neglecting the fact that there
are end effects when a cylindrical structure is nite, the
solution for a cylindrical is identical in cross section to that
of the two-dimensional solution. Fig. 7a shows the geome-
try for a cylindrical lens, fed by a line source, which could
typically be a slotted waveguide. The illuminating wave-
front is cylindrical.
The rigor of deriving the equations for the geometric
surfaces in structures that have some symmetry in a
spherical coordinate system can be avoided by simply
rotating the two-dimensional solution about its axis to
obtain solutions with rotational rather than translational
symmetry. For convenience, these lenses will be called
spherical, although they are, of course, not spheres. A
spherical lens fed by a point source is shown in Fig. 7b.
The illuminating wavefront is spherical.
Both these lenses would be constructed of a natural
dielectric, n41, because of their plano-convex shape. For
3D structures with no1, parallel-plate lenses are popular
because of their light weight and low loss, and two possible
structures are shown in Fig. 8; dielectric spacers would be
used to hold the conducting sheets in place. The structure
for a cylindrical lens with the conducting planes in the xy
plane, is shown in Fig. 8a; the E eld is also polarized in
this plane, and Snells law is satised over the concave
area of the lens. In the lens of Fig. 8b, the conducting
planes lie in the xz plane, as does the E eld. It is,
however, a constrained lens, and Snells law is not satis-
ed over the concave face of the lens. For both examples,
an appropriate slotted waveguide for forming a linear
source is shown.
Figure 9 shows a spherical lens constructed of parallel
plates, and fed by a point source. As with lenses con-
structed from natural dielectrics, the principles of zoning
can be applied to the parallel-plate lenses. Arrays of
closely packed waveguides of round, rectangular or hex-
agonal cross section are used as a constraining medium in
the construction of waveguide lenses. When the operating
frequency of the lens lies within the frequency band of the
y
P
S
P
F
x
y
x
S P
P
F
(0, y
1
)
(0, y
1
)
(x
2
, y
2
)
(x
2
, y
2
)
f
d
K = 1
2
3
4
y
x
F
f d
(a)
(c)
(b)
Figure 6. Lenses with two refracting surfaces: (a) one surface
plane; (b) the same lens, zoned; (c) both surfaces curved.
(a) (b)
Figure 7. Cylindrical lens fed by a line source (such as a slotted
waveguide) and (b) spherical lens fed by a point source, such as a
small horn.
y

x
z
E
E
E
E
y

x

z
(a) (b)
Figure 8. Cylindrical lenses constructed of parallel plates: (a)
lens not constrained; (b) lens constrained. An appropriate wave-
guide linefeed is shown in each case.
LENS ANTENNAS 2323
waveguide, lenses can be constructed that can be zoned in
the same way as the dielectric or parallel plate lenses, and
Fig. 10 shows schematically the structure of a zoned
rectangular waveguide lens with one planar surface and
one concave surface. If the correct dimensions are chosen
for the elemental waveguides, the appropriate TE mode
will propagate as discussed above, and ensure the correct
phase delay through the lens. Waveguide lenses constrain
the wave in at least one of the major axes [3]. The major
advantage of this type of lens is that, because the ele-
mental waveguides are symmetric about the major axes of
the lens, the incident wave can be circularly polarized,
without any loss of lens action.
Integrated dielectric lenses, with the source embedded
in the dielectric of the lens, have found application in
integrated systems, where the lens is mounted directly on
top of the stripline or microstrip board that feeds the lens
and carries the rest of a microwave circuit. Figure 11
shows an example of such a lens.
1.6. Other Lens Systems
In the areas of application where lenses offer the best
solution, it is because of their ability to scan a narrow
beam over a relatively wide angle, that they nd regular
application. In many instances, substantially more com-
plex lens systems satisfy this need. While a more exten-
sive treatment will be given in Section 3, a brief
qualitative description is given here. It will be seen that
specic conditions need to be met for a lens to properly
collimate the radiation of a source that lies off the focus of
the lens. One way to ensure a larger focal area is to design
a lens with a multiplicity of focal points. This makes it
possible to feed the lens from a number of different points,
each corresponding to a new position of the beam of the
lens.
1.6.1. Constrained Lens. The constrained lens shown in
Fig. 12 has two perfect off-axis focal points, from where the
radiation will be collimated in a direction off the main axis
of the lens. A source illuminating the lens from anywhere
on a circular arc with radius f, and centered at the origin
O, will cause the lens to scan in a different direction for
each position. Because of these points are not foci, the
collimation of the beam will not be perfect, but it will be
good enough, provided the source lies between Fand F
/
. By
arranging a number of sources on the feed arc, a different
beam can be scanned for each of the sources illuminating
the lens.
A geometric analysis shows that for two symmetric foci
the inner surface of the lens must be an ellipse, with the
Figure 9. Spherical lens constructed from parallel plates.
Figure 10. Cross sections through zoned lens of rectangular
waveguide.
(a) (b)
Figure 11. Integrated dielectic lens: (a) the lens is shown on a
substrate; (b) thin lens with the same focal length.
F
Q
F
P
Q P
O
f
O
(x
2
, y
2
)
(x
1
, y
1
)
x
y
d
Figure 12. Constrained lens with two symmetric focal points.
2324 LENS ANTENNAS
two focal points F and F
/
on the foci of the ellipse. The
construction of the lens would be either as in Fig. 8b, of
parallel plates, or of stacked waveguides. The choices that
will determine the specic shape of the outer surface of the
lens, and other design parameters coupled to it, are
discussed in Section 3.2.
1.6.2. The Rotman Lens. In the Rotman lens shown in
Fig. 13, the lens consists of a structure that does not have
a dielectric per se, not even parallel plates. Each of the two
lens surfaces consists of a number of antennas, connected
one on one by means of a section of coaxial line. The
lengths of the lines determine the phase delay that would
normally be associated with the delay through a lens
section. The lens is fed from a series of points on a curve
FF
/
as for the constrained lens discussed above; the
structure makes it possible to change the outer lens sur-
face shape arbitrarily.
The Rotman lens, of course, is a constrained lens, and
originally the lens was constructed of parallel plates that
bound the wave between the beam ports (the lens illumi-
nating radiators) and the element ports (the inner surface
of the lens). Currently, the most popular form of realiza-
tion has the beam and element ports constructed of etched
tapers, with the inner beam cavity area of stripline, as is
shown in Fig. 14.
Because of the stringy transmission lines that connect
the two faces of the lens, these lenses are also known as
bootlace lenses.
1.6.3. The R-2R Lens. Another type of bootlace lens is
the R-2R lens shown in Fig. 15. In this lens the feeding
curve (the beam port) and the inner face of the lens (the
element port) both lie on the same circle of radius R, while
the array port containing the radiating elements of the
array lie on a circle of radius 2R. The array elements are
connected to the element port elements by transmission
lines of equal length, and the lens can scan over a wide
angle, free of any distortion.
1.6.4. The Luneburg Lens. A unique and interesting
lens, rst described by Luneburg [4], is shown in Fig. 16.
The Luneburg lens is a spherically symmetric lens with
variable index of refraction, given by n=(2r
2
)
1/2
for a
sphere of unit radius. When the lens is fed at any point on
the surface, it produces a plane wave in a direction
diametrically opposite to the feedpoint. In view of the
symmetry, moving the feedpoint about the surface results
in a scanned beam from a direction diametrically opposite
the feedpoint.
Because of the problem of manufacturing a body with a
predetermined variation of the dielectric, a number
of approximations consisting of discrete shells of xed
dielectric constant are used; these are described in Sec-
tion 3.4.
1.6.5. Fresnel Zone Plate Lenses. The concept of the
Fresnel lens dates from the middle of the nineteenth
century, but was until recently (as of 2004) seen as an
optical rather than an RF or microwave device. It differs
radically from the other lenses described in this article,
insofar as it does not make use of the principle of refrac-
tion, but rather uses reection and diffraction.
In its simplest form, the Fresnel lens consists of pro-
perly spaced concentric rings of alternately transparent
F
F
Figure 13. Rotman lens: layout and ray geometry.
E
l
e
m
e
n
t

p
o
r
t

B
e
a
m

p
o
r
t

Beam cavity
Figure 14. Beam cavity of Rotman lens.
y
x
R
2R
Figure 15. R-2R lens.

LENS ANTENNAS 2325
and opaque or reective material. The sizes of the rings
are so chosen that the pathlength from the outside dia-
meter to the focus is one-half wavelength longer than the
pathlength to the focus from the inside diameter, as shown
in Fig. 17. Energy is reected and diffracted from the rings
in such a way that the forward-scattered components add
nominally in phase at the focal point of the plateat least,
their phases will differ by less than half a period. Because
of very poor aperture efciency, practical Fresnel lenses
have been developed that are constructed from alternate
rings of different dielectrics. Zone plate lenses are attrac-
tive solutions when low material weight, low absorption
loss and at lens surfaces are relevant design factors.
2. LENS DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS
This section addresses a number of practical considera-
tions pertaining to the operation of lens antennas, as well
as aspects that have to be taken into consideration with
the design of such structures.
2.1. Lens Design Equations
The design equations for the lenses described in Section 1,
are derived readily from rst principles [1,2]:
For the simple planoconvex lens of Fig. 3a
r =
(n 1)f
n cos j 1
(2)
y =
(n
2
1)x
2
2(n 1) fx
_
(3)
The maximum thickness of the lens is given by
d=
1
(n1)
f
2
n1
n 1
_ _
a
2
f
_ _
(4)
For the ellipitical lens (Fig. 3b),
r
1
=f d (5)
r
2
=
(n 1)f
n cos j
(6)
y
1
=
(f t)
2
(x
1
f )
2
_
(7)
y
2
=
2
n 1
n
_ _
fx
2
n
2
1
n
2
_ _
x
2
2
(8)
The central thickness of the lens given by
d=
2r
1
4r
2
1
d
2
_
2(n 1)
(9)
For the concave lens with n o1, as shown in Fig. 4, we
obtain
r =
(1 n)f
1 n cos j
(10)
y =
2(1 n)(x)f (1 n
2
) x
2
_
(11)
2.2. Zoning: Equations and Effects
The usefulness and purpose of zoning has been discussed
in Section 1. Johnson and Jasik [2] give equations that
describe the surfaces of zoned lenses.
y
x
Figure 16. Luneburg lens.
r 1
r 2
r 3
r 4
r 1
r 2
x
f
n
0
/2

n 1

n
(n 1)
0
/2
x
y
x
(b)
(a)
(c)
Figure 17. Fresnel lens. Basic structure is shown in (a); shadow-
ing is illustrated in (b). Use of dielectric annuli is illustrated in (c).
2326 LENS ANTENNAS
Referring to the zoned lens of Fig. 5b, we have
r =
(n 1)f
1
(K 1)l
n cos j 1
(12)
y =
(n
2
1)x
2
2(n 1)f
1
x 2(K 1)lnx 2f
1
(K 1)l (K 1)
2
l
2
_
K =1; 2; 3; 4:::
(13)
For the zoned concave lens of Fig. 5c, we obtain
r =
(1 n)f
1
(K 1)l
1 n cos j
(14)
y =
2(1 n)(x)f
1
(1 n
2
)x
2
2(K 1)(x)nl 2(K 1)f
1
l (K 1)
2
l
2
_
;
K =1; 2; 3; 4:::
(15)
The lens shown in Fig. 6b has two surfaces, and its zoning
equations are given by
x
2
=
(K 1)l (n 1)df
f
2
y
2
1
_
n
1
y
2
1
n
2
(f
2
y
2
1
)
_
_
1
y
2
1
n
2
(f
2
y
2
1
)
(16)
y
2
=y
1
1
x
2
n
2
(f
2
y
2
1
) y
2
1
_
_
_
_
_
K =1; 2; 3; 4:::
(17)
Unfortunately, zoning has some disadvantages; Fig. 18a
illustrates one of them. If the lens is a zoned single
surface, there will be a solid-angle section in which the
energy is not refracted into the lens path. This represents
loss. On the other hand, for the zoned two-surface lens
shown in Fig. 18b, no energy will be lost, but a section of
the aperture will not be illuminated. This will cause
degradation of sidelobe performance. If the zoning is
done in the plane surface of a single-surface lens, it is
possible to achieve a situation with no loss or shadowing.
However, this represents the more unattractive case,
where the lens retains the shape of the large, curved
surface, which is mechanically much more difcult to
handle (Fig. 18c). A similar situation arises with lenses
where no1, as shown in Fig. 18d. Ultimately, the decision
on the shape of the lens will be determined by practical
considerations.
The other major disadvantage of zoning affects band-
width, in that the zoned lens is inherently frequency-
sensitive. But as will be seen in Section 2.5 on bandwidth,
there can also be an upside to zoning when applied to
parallel-plate or waveguide lenses.
2.3. Gain and Sidelobe Level
The illumination of the radiating aperture is the primary
variable in determining the gain and sidelobe level of an
antenna. In certain instances, such as with antenna
arrays, extremely intricate eld distributions are possible,
making for very specic sidelobe performance; associated
directly with the sidelobe performance is the gain. Lower
sidelobes generally mean a broader beamwidth, and a
decrease in gain. Consequently the eld in the aperture of
the lens is of primary concern.
In the case of a lens with a hyperbolic surface, it has
already been pointed out that the maximum size of the
lens is limited by the asymptotes. Silver [1] derives an
expression for the amplitude distribution over the lens
aperture. If the distance from a point on the lens surface to
the axis of a spherical lens is given by r =a sinj, and if the
source radiates an amplitude of A(j), then the ratio of
amplitudes between the source and aperture is given by
A(r)
A(j)
=
(n cos j 1)
3
f
2
(n 1)
2
(n cos j)
(18)
For the cylindrical hyperbola, the ratio of source to
aperture elds is given by
A(y)
A(j)
=
(n cos j 1)
2
(n 1) f (n cos j)
(19)
As the amount of power per unit solid angle radiated from
the source is constant, and as the projected area of the lens
in becomes substantially larger, there will be a severe
dropoff of illuminating eld toward the edges. In this case,
the low edge illumination implies low sidelobe levels and
not much can be done to increase the illumination around
the edges.
Figure 18. Effects of zoning. Energy in the shaded solid angle in
(a) is lost. In (b) there is no loss, but the aperture is shaded. For
the stepped lens in (c) there is no loss or shading. Shading in a
concave lens is shown in (d).
LENS ANTENNAS 2327
For the lens with an elliptic contour, the corresponding
amplitude ratios are
A(r)
A(j)
=
(n cos j)
3
f
2
(n 1)
2
(n cos j 1)
(20)
and
A(y)
A(j)
=
(n cos j)
2
(n 1)f (n cos j 1)
: (21)
For this lens, the limiting variable occurs on the secondary
(radiating) side of the lens; the lens cannot be made larger
than the largest dimension of the ellipse. In this case, the
illumination is substantially stronger at the edges of the
lens. Here edge illumination is naturally reduced by
practical feeds, such as horns or linear waveguide arrays.
Radiation from the source antenna in any complex
antenna system is always designed to illuminate the
secondary element with the largest possible portion of
the available power. Spillover from the primary radiator
represents a loss of gain, and it is usually attempted to
ensure that spillover is as small as possible, by choosing
an appropriate element or elements for the purpose.
2.4. Reections and Loss
In the qualitative discussion on lenses so far attention has
been given only to the direct ray paths that contribute to
the formation of the radiation properties of the antenna.
Unfortunately, at each interface between two materials,
reection occurs; such reections in general do not add in
a way that enhances the performance of the antenna.
Consider, for instance, the lens in Fig. 3a. The wave
striking the plane interface between the lens and air is
partially reected back into the lens, to retrace along the
same path on which it had entered the lens, and is
concentrated at the focal point, causing a substantial
mismatch at the feedpoint. Similarly, at the circular sur-
face in Fig. 3b, where the rst circular wavefront strikes
the lens, the wave is partially reected straight back at
the source.
Referring to Fig. 1, for perpendicular polarization, (i.e.,
the electric eld perpendicular to the plane of incidence),
the coefcient of reection at an interface is given by
r
J
=
E
r
E
i
=
cos j
i
n
2
sin
2
j
i
_
cos j
i
n
2
sin
2
j
i
_ (22)
and for parallel polarization
r
[[
=
E
r
E
i
=
n
2
cos j
i
n
2
sin
2
j
i
_
n
2
cos j
i
n
2
sin
2
j
i
_ (23)
where E
r
is the reected eld strength and E
i
is the
incident eld.
At perpendicular incidence, the magnitude of the re-
ected eld could be of the order of the surface reection
coefcient for a plane wave. For a dielectric constant of
2.56, n=1.6, this could be as high as 12.7 dB, correspond-
ing to a loss in gain of 0.24 dB.
As in optical instruments, the lens may be coated in a
quarter-wavelength layer of index of refraction, n
l
=n
1/2
to
ensure a match between the two media. Application at a
plane surface is obviously relatively easy, but at a slope
the effective thickness in the direction of the incident wave
must be used. Certain other devices are employed to either
cancel the reected power, or to concentrate it elsewhere.
A slight offset of the feed from the lens axis will focus the
reections at a point outside the feed antenna. In a
method similar to zoning, the lens may be split and half
of it displaced axially by a quarter-wavelength in the lens
medium, causing the reected power from the two halves
to cancel. The two halves will, of course, have focal lengths
that differ by a quarter-wavelength in the medium. Other
reections that do not add constructively at the feedpoint
may not cause mismatch, but will, of course, represent a
loss of power, and thus reduced gain. Johnson and Jasik
[2] describe a number of different surface treatments that
can be applied to the lens surface in order to affect a
quarter-wave match.
Although not caused by reection, dielectirc losses can
be lumped conveniently with reection losses. In the case
of natural dielectrics, all materials are lossy to some
extent. In some parallel-plate lenses, a dielectric is used
to separate the conducting plates; in such arrays both
conductive loss and dielectric loss will occur inside the
lens. For a zoned dielectric lens, the attenuation through
the dielectric is given [2] approximately by 27.3 (tan d)
n/(n1) dB, and for a stepped polystyrene lens at 10 GHz,
with e
/
=2.54 and tan d =4.310
4
is about 0.02 dB.
2.5. Bandwidth
A simple dielectric lens would theoretically have innite
bandwidth, and in practice the bandwidth is in fact very
large. This is obviously dependent on the material, and if
the latter is not dispersive (v is not a function of fre-
quency), the lens will be wideband. On the other hand,
parallel-plate and waveguide lenses are extremely disper-
sive, and will exhibit narrow bandwidth.
As soon as the lens is zoned, though, the structure
becomes frequency-dependent, and the effective band-
width is a function of the number of zones. Conventionally,
it is assumed that if an antenna has been designed for a
specic radiation pattern, then degradation of the pattern
will be acceptable only up to the point where the phase
error across the aperture of the antenna amounts to 22.51
or l8. Silver [1] derives that a lens with K zones separated
by steps of one wavelength will have a bandwidth of
approximately 25/(K1) percent. A lens with six zones
(ve steps) will have a bandwidth of 5%.
The lenses with no1 are all dispersive, as discussed in
Section 1.1. In practice, the bandwidth limitation caused
by the dispersiveness of the lens material is much higher
than that caused by zoning. With the same l/8 error
allowed across the width of the lens, the bandwidth is
2328 LENS ANTENNAS
given by approximately
B -
25n
0
(1 n
0
)
l
0
(1 n
0
)t
(24)
where n
0
, l
0
are, respectively, the refractive index and
wavelength at the center frequency and t is the difference
in thickness of the lens between the edge and the center.
Because the waveguide or parallel-plate medium is so
dispersive, reducing its length by zoning actually in-
creases the useful bandwidth. For K zones, the bandwidth
is given approximately by [1]
B -
25
(K 1)
(1 n
0
)
n
0
(1 n
0
)t
l
0
(25)
Under the assumption that (1n
0
)t is approximately one
wavelength at the thickest sections of the lens, we have
B -
25n
0
1Kn
0
(26)
Proctor [5] analyses and describes methods of construct-
ing lenses from slot-loaded ridged waveguides. The struc-
tures make it possible to improve the scanning ability, and
also eliminates the discontinuities associated with zones.
The spacing of the plates in a waveguide lens has a critical
aspect, in that at each of the plates, diffraction occurs. In
order to avoid the diffracted elds adding constructively,
the plate spacing must be kept below the value deter-
mined by the inequality l
0
/d41 sinj, where j is the
angle of incidence of the wave.
2.6. Natural and Articial Dielectrics
A wide variety of dielectric materials, specically manu-
factured for application in microwave applications, are
available in the market. These can be divided in a number
of classes. Materials with very low dielectric constant are
usually some type of foam with a plastic base. Materials
with a dielectric constant in the region of 24 are mainly
plastics. Examples are Teon (e
r
=2.04), Teon berglass
(e
r
=2.7), Plexiglas (e
r
=2.56), and polystyrene (e
r
=2.54).
Ceramic materials such as BaZnTa (e
r
=30), BaTiO
3
(bar-
ium titanate, e
r
=30), and BaTiO
9
(barium tetratitanate,
e
r
=38), [6] are often mixed with plastics. One example of a
commercial product is described as a ceramic-lled cross-
linked plastic, with dielectric constants available as e
r
=
3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,12,15,20.
In Section 1, the use of parallel plates as an articial
dielectric was discussed. For the transverse electric (TE)
wave (E eld parallel to conducting plates), the propaga-
tion velocity varies rapidly as the wavelength approaches
double the plate spacing:
v =
c
(1 l=l
c
)
2
_ (27)
In the TE mode, the refractive index is given by
n=
1 (l=l
c
)
2
_
(28)
where the cutoff wavelength l
c
=2a for a plate separation
of a.
For waveguides operating in the TE mode, Equation
(28) holds for parallel plates. In this instance, a rectan-
gular waveguide of width a has l
c
=2a; a regular hexagon
with a between parallel sides has l
c
=1.792a, and a
circular waveguide with radius a has l
c
=1.705a. The
application of waveguides in lens design is comprehen-
sively discussed by Rudge [3].
Brown [7] gives an extensive theoretical treatment of
articial dielectrics. They are categorized into two
classesdelay dielectrics and phase advance dielec-
tricsthe derivation of which is self-explanatory. Parallel
plates or waveguides are obviously in the second group,
because of the value of the refractive index. Also in this
group of structures are arrays of metallic rods, as well as
perforated metallic plates that are held in position by
means of a dielectric supporting medium such as a di-
electric foam. Among the delay dielectrics are metallic
strips or metallic disks suspended in a substrate. Jasik [8]
provides comprehensive information on a wide variety of
structures, including those mentioned above. An interest-
ing variation is described by Milne [9], who uses the phase
shift (negative below resonance and positive above) of a
wave traveling through an array of dipoles, to design the
necessary delay structure. Other authors treat the general
problem of composite dielectric materials [10,11].
2.7. Aberrations
In optical systems, the main purpose is usually to form an
image, either real or virtual. In the functioning of lens
antennas, this is not relevant, except to the extent that an
image is composed of a collection of points that do not all
lie on a single focal point. In a lens antenna the equivalent
is that there are sources that illuminate the lens, that lie
off the focal point, as well as nonideal characteristics in
lens design and performance. Analogous to the aberra-
tions that occur in optical systems, equivalent aberrations
occur in lens antennas, and a number of different types of
aberration exist; these are comprehensively treated by Lo
and Lee [12]. The source of aberrations in lens antennas is
a phase error with respect to a reference plane in the
aperture of the lens. The phase error could be caused by
inherent properties such as the lens not meeting the equal
phase path condition or the source being located away
from the focus of the lens.
If the phase error across the aperture is linear, it
results in the beam squinting off boresight. In practice
this is not a problem with lens antennas. Many examples
exist in antenna theory of where a quadratic phase error is
introduced to an aperture, and the effect of such errors is
well known (see, e.g., Ref. 1, Chap. 6.7; Ref. 2, Chap. 2.8;
and Ref. 9).
In lens antennas, the most important aberration is
coma, because it relates the formation of a properly
LENS ANTENNAS 2329
collimated beam by a point lying off the focal point. In an
1873 paper, E. Abbe postulated that in order for any
optical system to form an image, it must satisfy the
condition that the principal surface, dened as the locus
of intersections of the initial and nal paths of rays, is
spherical. An optical system satisfying this condition thus
acts as a simple spherical lens, and the Abbe sine condi-
tion is satised. Referring to Fig. 19, h= sin j=f . The
circular curvature of radius f satises the condition, as
does the lens shown, because the initial and nal rays
intersect on the radius f. It is now also clear that the
simple planoconvex lens of Fig. 3(a) cannot satisfy this
condition.
Note that a simple parabolic mirror does not satisfy the
Abbe sine condition, either, since the principal surface is
the paraboloid itself. Paraxial rays (rays incident on the
mirror and parallel to the optical axis) will focus at a point,
but off-axis sources will not. It is possible to meet the Abbe
sine condition with two refracting surfaces, as discussed in
Section 3.1.
3. WIDE-ANGLE AND SCANNING LENSES
3.1. Wide-Angle Dielectric Lenses
The inability of the lens to collimate properly the radiation
from a source offset from the focal axis of the lens is a key
element in the performance of a lens designed for wide-
angle scanning, and a variety of approaches to improve
the scanning properties of dielectric lenses have been
developed. The simple hyperboloidal lens is not suitable
for substantially displaced feeds in order to scan the
mainbeam, and the effects on the lens performance with
feed displacement have been analyzed by Kreutel [13]. For
small values of the ratio between focal length and dia-
meter f/D and small values of n, coma dominates; with
increase in these parameters, astigmatism gradually be-
comes the dominant aberration.
Making use of thin-lens theory, Rotman [14] develops
an analysis in which the zoned lens is approximated by an
ideally thin spherical shell. This is applied to evaluate the
phase aberrations in the aperture plane of the lens, which
are caused by off-axis scanning and deviations from the
design frequency. A set of universal curves, that predict
the decrease in directive gain of the lens as function of
scan angle and frequency is developed from this theory.
By shaping the lens for aperture distribution control,
specic radiation patterns can be achieved through use of
the procedure described by Lee [15]. For multiple-beam
applications, the design procedure makes it possible to
reduce the phase error for off-axis beams by means of coma
correction zoning.
A dielectric lens with two refracting surfaces intro-
duces an additional variable, which makes it possible to
design a lens with two conjugate off-axis focal points.
Peebles [16] describes a procedure for design and analysis
of a bifocal dielectric lens with these properties. The lens
provides good off-axis performance, and a high-gain radia-
tion pattern over a large eld of view. Quadratic phase
error is reduced if the feed is constrained along an
optimized focal arc. The method of generic curve series
has been used [17] to obtain proles for antennas that
have a predetermined aperture amplitude distribution
from a given source distribution, or for agreement with
the Abbe sine condition.
3.2. Wide-Angle Waveguide Lenses
As has been pointed out for the family of dielectric lenses
above, it is possible to obtain wide scan angle performance
by ignoring the Abbe sine condition, if two perfect, sym-
metric off-axis foci are chosen, and illumination of the lens
is along a circular path between the two foci. The approach
was rst proposed by Ruze [18]. For the lens to collimate
the radiation, it is found that the inner surface of the lens
must be an ellipse, with the foci of the ellipse lying on the
chosen focal points of the lens. The problem has three
variables (inner and outer surfaces of the lens, and index
of refraction), and two variables are xed by choosing the
two foci. This leaves a choice of either the shape of the
outer surface, with n to be determined, or, if n is chosen,
the outer surface to be determined. It is also possible to
choose a third focal point that lies on the axis of the lens.
If the on-axis focal point is chosen, it is chosen such
that second-order phase deviation is zero. It is then found
that points that lie on an arc of a circle of radius f, centered
at the origin O, as shown in Fig. 12, will have good scan
performance. Different source antennas, all lying on the
arc FF
/
, will cause beams to be radiated from the lens in
different directions.
For the case of a single focal point, the inner surface is
described by a circle of radius f; this forms a sphere when
the lens is changed to a 3D body. The outer surface is an
ellipsoid described by
y
2
2
f
2

x
2
d fn=(1 n)
fn=(1 n)
_ _
2
=1 (29)
where f is the focal length, n is the refractive index, and d
is the minimum thickness of the lens.
If the lens is bifocal, the inner surface is an ellipsoid
with focal points at the lens foci, and the surface described
Figure 19. The Abbe sine condition.
2330 LENS ANTENNAS
by
y
2
1
f
2

x
1
f cos c
f cos c
_ _
2
=1 (30)
The outer surface is also an ellipsoid, described by
y
2
2
f
2

x
2
d (nf cos c)=(cos c n)
(nf cos c)=(cos c n)
_ _
2
=1 (31)
The design of a conventional waveguide lens is based on
the principle of equal phase delay for the different rays.
However, the rays at the edge of the lens have substan-
tially farther to travel than will those in the center, and
this inevitably means that, if the frequency changes from
the center frequency, the time delay through the lens
changes, leading to phase error, and decreased bandwidth.
As was pointed out earlier, this situation is alleviated by
zoning. Ajioka and Ramsey [19] describe a design proce-
dure that combines constant group delay characteristics
with wideband performance.
3.3. Bootlace Lenses
3.3.1. The Rotman Lens. The Rotman lens [20] is one of
a family of lenses popularly known as bootlace lenses,
because of the multitude of transmission lines connecting
the inner and outer surfaces of the lens. A brief description
of the basic operation of the Rotman lens (as it is usually
referred to) was given in Section 1.6. The Rotman lens has
two off-axis conjugate focal points and one on-axis focal
point. The fact that the shape of the outer surface of the
lens can be, in effect, arbitrarily chosen makes it possible
to choose four independent conditions to determine the
lens parameters. Rotman and Turner select the straight
front face of the lens, the two off-axis focal points, and the
on-axis focal point. The ray geometry of the lens is shown
in Fig. 20. They discuss the merits of different choices for
the position of the on-axis focal point.
The lens illustrated is two-dimensional (2D), and cy-
lindrical versions can be constructed by stacking a num-
ber of the lenses. Note that the area between the beam and
element ports is often referred to as the lens. Strictly
speaking, the lens comprises the elements in the element
port (the inner surface of the lens), the connecting trans-
mission lines, and the radiating array (the outer surface of
the lens). The region between the beam port that illumi-
nates the lens, and the element port that forms the inner
surface, will be termed the beam cavity, and it can be
constructed in a variety of media. For the beam and
element ports as waveguide horns, the beam cavity can
be parallel plates. If the elements of beam and element
ports are wideband tapers, stripline or microstrip would
be indicated, as is currently common practice. The lens
can also be used as a linear scanning feed for a cylindrical
reector, as described by Rotman and Turner.
Musa and Smith [21] describe factors that limit the
performance of microstrip lenses compared to parallel-
plate lenses. Amongst others, it is necessary to pay specic
attention to the design of the beam cavity area. Also, the
direction in which the elements in both ports point should
be considered.
A modication to the Rotman lens by Archer [22] has
the beam cavity area lled with dielectric. This has the
effect of reducing the linear dimensions of the lens by a
factor of n=(e
r
)
1/2
. Referring to Fig. 20, if the angle
subtended between the focal point and the axis is a and
the beam points in a direction c, then the ratio of sine of
the angles, g =sinc/sina. For g41, a design would give
large scan angles, while for g o1 the lens will be physi-
cally small.
As with any antenna design, the radiation pattern of
the antenna is an important parameter, and it is possible
to design for predetermined sidelobe patterns. Thomas
[23] describes a design in which 30-dB sidelobe levels
were achieved over a 10% bandwidth by the superposition
of multiple orthogonal beams; it is shown that the Taylor
line source distribution can be described as just such a
superposition. Only three beams were sufcient to provide
a good approximation to the exact Taylor distribution; the
design, however, necessitates a substantial increase in the
complexity of the feeding system.
Two or more beams are orthogonal if a signal input to
the beam port of one beam gives rise to an output in only
that beam, with no signal appearing in any of the other
beam patterns or ports. The Rotman and other wide-angle
lenses being lenses with multiple beams, this is an im-
portant consideration in the design of an antenna, and
Hansen [24] explains the effects of nonorthogonality, such
as loss of efciency and changes in sidelobe pattern.
A Rotman lens feed network for a beam forming net-
work implementation employing a 2D stack of Rotman
lenses to produce multiple overlapping beams that are
scanned in both elevation and azimuth directions
is described by Chan and Rao [25]. They present the
Beam
port
Element
port
Beam cavity
Array
port
l
2
f
2
l
1
l
3
f
1

y
3
y
2

y
x
(x
2
, y
2
)
Focus
Focus
Focus
Figure 20. Denitions in the design of a Rotman lens, after
Hansen [28]. (With permission, copyright r 1991; IEEE).
LENS ANTENNAS 2331
development of a compact beamforming network using
multiple Rotman lenses having identical design and pro-
ducing multiple beams with a hexagonal grid. The design
of the lens employs dual-port excitations for the beam ports
in order to minimize the spillover losses within the lens.
Three-dimensional lenses with two, three, and four
perfect focal points are described by Rao [26]. Lenses
with more focal points can be scanned to much larger
angles in one plane; a tradeoff with the scanning ability in
the orthogonal plane exists. In the design procedure
described, the lens cross section in the plane in which
the focal points lie is rst obtained as a 2D solution, and
then extended to a three-dimensional (3D) solution by
rotating the lens prole around the focal point axis of the
lens. In the design procedure proposed in Ref. 27, the
planar feed locus of a 2D design is replaced by a curved
feed locus optimized to minimize pathlength errors. The
design procedure can be extended to a quadrufocal lens
with four foci on a circular arc in the plane of the 2D
design.
Hansen [24] shows that rotating a Rotman lens to form
a symmetric lens does not yield good results and that a
circular focus is not possible. The four perfect foci cannot
be located with quadrantal symmetry.
3.3.2. Design Procedure. A very substantial body of
research and development has been established on the
Rotman lens. However, Hansen [28] has published an
efcient design procedure that very clearly sets out what
the interrelationships between the various choices in the
design of Rotman lenses are. The same optical pathlength
equality condition as before is applied to the structure of
Fig. 20. Note that the position of the focal arc, which
contains the three focal points, is not yet specied at this
stage. The design equations are repeated here in Hansens
nomenclature, in order to simplify use of his paper for
design purposes.
The problem is dened in terms of the relationship
between six basic design parameters, namely, the focal
angle a, the focal ratio b =f
2
/f
1
, which is the ratio between
upper and central focal lengths, the beam angle to ray
angle ratio g =sinc/sina, the maximum beam angle c
m
,
focal length f
1
/l and array element spacing d/l.
All the dimensions are normalized to the principal focal
length, f
1
. The ratio of the upper to central focal length is
given by
b=
f
2
f
1
(32)
as dened previously
g =
sin c
sin a
(33)
A convenient parameter that relates the distance y
3
of any
point on the array axis to the principal focal length f
1
is
given by
z =
y
3
g
f
1
(34)
This parameter controls the portion of the phase and
amplitude error that the lens experiences. For a lens
with NE radiating elements, spaced a distance d apart,
the maximum value that y
3
can have is given by y
max
=
(NE1)d/2. Substituting gives
z
max
=
(NE 1)gd
2f
1
(35)
An upper limit on z occurs when the tangent to the
element port curve is vertical; this coincides with w=0.
This value of z is given by
z
w=0
=
2
1 bC
_
S
1
1 bC
S
2
_
(36)
where C=cos a, S=sina.
The linelength w that connects the elements on the
element port to the array elements is given by the quad-
ratic lens equation
a
w
f
1
_ _
2
b
w
f
1
c =0; (37)
where the coefcients of the equation involve the para-
meters a, b, and g and are given by
a=1
(1 b)
2
(1 bC)
2
z
2
b
2
(38)
b = 2
2z
2
b

2 1 b ( )
1 bC

z
2
S
2
1 b ( )
(1 bC)
2
(39)
c = z
2
z
2
S
2
1 bC
z
4
S
4
4(1 bC)
2
(40)
If the maximum beam angle is given by c
m
, then the
maximum allowable array element spacing that will avoid
the creation of grating lobes is given by
d
l
=
1
2 sin c
m
_ (41)
The task at hand is to determine the optimum values for a,
b, g, and f
1
/l.
Hansen sets out the design procedure that amongst
others considers the following:
1. The useful range for z is roughly from 0.5 to 0.8, and
from this a value of b for a given a follows.
2. Six charts in Hansens paper [28] show the effect of
the choice of variables. It has a bearing on lens
width, which in turn affects spillover loss, transmis-
sion line loss, amplitude errors, and other para-
meters.
3. Avalue of a is chosen that makes the two surfaces of
the beam cavity approximately the same height. b
has a similar effect to a, and tabulated values for
pairs of these two variables are given.
2332 LENS ANTENNAS
4. Changing g leaves the port curves relatively unaf-
fected, but the relative positions of the foci change.
5. Changing values of c
m
spreads the beam ports apart,
and determines the maximum element spacing.
6. Changing the focal length changes the separation
between the ports, as well as all spacings.
7. Curves showing the effect of parameter choices on
phase and amplitude errors are given.
8. Finally, the gain of the lens array can be calculated
from [3, Chap. 9]
G=
N
n=1
A
n
N
n=1
N
m=1
A
n
A
+
m
sinc(n m)2pd=l
(42)
where A
n
, is the excitation of the array elements.
With the performance parameters frequency range,
number of beams, and maximum scan known, the number
and spacing of the radiating elements is determined. The
maximum value of beam element spacing is limited by the
maximum scan angle, and occurs when d/l =1/(2 sin
c
m
). At the center frequency, making use of the guidelines
given, a, b, and g are selected to ensure that the lens meets
certain practical and realistic criteria of size and propor-
tion. Once the design parameters have been determined,
the gain of the lens can be calculated. It is also possible to
make the beam port arc elliptical rather than circular, but
Hansen points out that this is not usually warranted,
except for very large lenses. The design procedure also
includes an evaluation of phase and amplitude errors.
Hansen [24] points out that in practice, bootlace and
other lenses are not designed with discrete foci. Rather,
the optimum design is a minimax solution for circles of
least confusion; that is, aberrations are minimized over
the aperture in a sense such as least mean squares. The
resultant design produces slightly undened foci, but
better performance. The use of determining the foci, lies
in classifying lenses, and developing a sense of how errors
are related to lens geometry.
3.3.3. Analysis. The design procedure described above
yields the basic dimensions of the lens. However, there are
many other aspects that pertain to the physical realization
of any given design and make it almost impossible to do a
complete design as the result of a sequence of steps. Once
the basic design has been achieved, the practical realiza-
tion of the design needs to be brought into the picture, and
to this purpose, analysis methods are very important.
Peterson and Rausch [29] describe an analysis proce-
dure that takes into consideration aspects of the lens
design such as the cavity sidewall and port widths, which
are parameters not specied by the design procedure.
These parameters substantially affect the sidelobe level
and insertion loss. The effect of mutual coupling is also
included in the analysis procedure. As an example, they
quote measured sidelobe levels of 17 dB with straight
sidewalls for the beam cavity, while with triangular side-
walls, the sidelobe level improved to 32 dB for a lens with
34 array ports and 19 beam ports. The design sidelobe
level was 40 dB, Taylor n=3.
Yuan et al. [30] describe an analysis procedure for
Rotman lenses based on a hybrid least-squares nite/
transnite-element method. They point out that most
design procedures are based on ray optics, and neglects
the effects of port reections, mutual coupling between
elements, and multiple scattering between ports. The
procedure used yields the distribution of the electromag-
netic elds in the lens, as well as the scattering para-
meters. They illustrate their procedure by comparing the
calculated and measured results for a microstrip Rotman
lens with nine beam ports and eight array ports.
3.3.4. The R-2R Lens. The R-2R lens is a bootlace lens in
which the radiators on the beam port and element port lie
on a circle of diameter R, and where the element ports are
connected by equal-length radiators. The properties of the
lens are readily derived from the geometry of Fig. 21. If
the line OP is extended to intersect the circle 2R at Q, then
Q denes the position that the array element must have
that is connected to the element port at P. If OP subtends
an angle of j with the x axis, then the radius to P will
subtend an angle of 2j. It is clear that, even if the beam
port and element port radiators were coincidental, the
antenna could not scan more than 7901.
In practice, in order to locate the beam and element
radiators, the antenna has a restricted scan angle. For
cases where extremely wide scan angles are necessary,
Clapp [31] has developed a solution making use of four or
six physical lenses and hybrid junctions to provide up to
3601 scanning.
3.4. The Luneburg Lens
Luneburg [4] solves the problem of determining the index
of refraction for a spherical lens that collimates the
radiation from any point on the surface of the lens in a
direction diametrically opposite. As stated in the introduc-
tion, the index of refraction needs to vary as n=(2r
2
)
1/2
.
The chief advantages of the Luneburg lens are its ability
to scan multiple beams over wide angles, as well as the
inherently wide bandwidth. The main disadvantages lie in
its bulkiness, and associated weight, and the practical
difculty of manufacturing the varying index of refraction.
2
R
2R
x
y
P
Q S
Q
m

O
Figure 21. R-2R lens geometry.
LENS ANTENNAS 2333
The two-dimensional analysis of the Luneburg lens is
given by Peeler and Archer [32]. The relationship between
the feed pattern and the aperture eld is found to be
proportional to (sec c)
1/2
, where c is the angle subtended
with the axis of the lens, inferring that the lens has a very
high edge illumination. They describe the performance of
a lens constructed by lling the cavity between two
parallel-plates with dielectric, and propagating the TE
10
waveguide mode, which is also a parallel-plate mode. The
separation between the plates is varied to obtain the
desired variation in effective index of refraction.
The two-dimensional Luneburg lens nds application
as source for a parabolic reector in a scanning antenna
[33]. A variety of other structures, all making use of the
dispersive properties of propagation between sets of (not
parallel) plates function as Luneburg lenses with 2D
radiation patterns [34].
Braun [35] derives expressions for the radiation pat-
tern, beamwidth, sidelobe level, and gain of the spheri-
cally symmetric Luneburg lens. Because of the high edge
illumination of the aperture, the lens has a high gain, and
high sidelobe level, typically at 17 dB.
The fact that the index of refraction has to change with
radius, presents a problem. If a choice is made that the
lens shall have a single index of refraction, then it is
possible to have only one point on the lens surface that will
support a ray of the same electrical length as the ray
through the center, as well as its mirror image. For a lens
of diameter 20 wavelengths, and the point of equal elec-
trical length chosen at 301 from the axis of the lens, it is
found that the phase error across the lens is 0.1l, which is
quite acceptable [2, Chap. 18-2]. An increase in the lens
diameter will increase the phase error.
An alternative is to construct the lens from shells and an
inner sphere of different dielectrics [36]. However, the dis-
crete quantization of the lens into steps in the vicinity of a
wavelength or more, causes the appearance of grating lobes
in the radiation pattern, and should be guarded against.
In a procedure described by Mosallaei and Rahmat-
Samii [37], an optimized design procedure is described
that strives to minimize the number of dielectric shells. In
a radially uniform design, reduction of the number of
shells decreases the gain and increases the occurrence of
grating lobes. They make use of a genetic algorithm
optimizer to determine the optimum layer thickness and
permittivity for the desired gain and sidelobe envelope.
Rondineau et al. [38] describe the design, construction,
and performance of a spherical lens constructed by slicing
the spherical body into 2N disks. Each disk then has to
approximate the relevant varying index of refraction; this
is achieved by drilling holes through the disks. A larger
number of holes along the periphery of each disk approx-
imates the low values of n toward the outside of the lens,
while toward the center of each disk, the number of holes
are reduced, until, for the central disks, the innermost
area is left unpenetrated. In the example cited, there were
20 disks constructed of Teon with e
r
=2.04. The lens
diameter was 150mm, and at 27.5 GHz had a gain of
28.5 dB. The authors provide full information on deter-
mining the thickness of the disks, and the number and
spacing of the holes.
An interesting variation on the spherical Luneburg
lens is the cylindrical Luneburg lens [39]. In instances
where the scanning capabilities of the conventional lens
are not needed, a cylindrical lens of nite-length forms a
useful lens antenna. The lens can be designed to have
a focal point on its surface, and is constructed from a
number of concentric cylinders; in the example cited, the
lens was constructed by including cylindrical voids to
obtain the varying dielectric constant.
A study of the Luneburg lens would be incomplete
without mentioning it properties as a radar reector
[2,40]. If the lens is partially capped, then energy incident
from a direction opposite to the cap will be reected back
from the cap and reradiated in the same direction, func-
tioning as a very effective radar reector, which has a
large radar cross section over a wide angle.
4. INTEGRATED AND PLANE LENSES
4.1. Integrated Dielectric Lenses
Dielectric lenses are very well suited to integration di-
rectly onto millimeter and submillimeterwave circuits, but
with the growing application of local and indoor wireless
networks, are becoming more relevant at microwave
frequencies. Typically, the dielectric lens is mounted di-
rectly on the microwave integrated circuit substrate that
carries the active microwave network, as shown in Fig.
11a [41]. Feeding is done directly by means of dipoles or
slots or pairs of slots [42] etched in a metallized area.
Typically, this would be a lens that radiates from a more to
a less dense dielectric material, and is therefore an
ellipsoid of revolution, as was discussed for the dielectric
lenses in Section 1.2.
In its most elemental form, the lens is a solid dielectric,
and the source is mounted at the far focus of the ellipsoid.
This makes for a lens that is very easily mounted, and it
eliminates the reections that occur when the inner sur-
face of the lens is spherical. However, at the same time a
new source of serious mismatch is introduced at the source
antenna. In the event that the inner surface of an ellip-
tical lens lies between the two foci of the ellipse that
describes the outer lens surface, the phenomenon of
doubly reected rays occurs; of this, the solid dielectric
lens is an example. A ray leaving the source focus point is
partially reected at the lens surface; this reected energy
travels through the second focal point, strikes the surface
once again, and is reected back to the source. This
happens for all possible paths in the lens; because of the
properties of the ellipse, all rays thus reected arrive at
the source in phase, causing a mismatch. Neto et al. [43]
have analyzed the effects of multiple reections inside an
elliptical dielectric lens operating in the millimeterwave
area, and make use of physical optics to derive an expres-
sion for the input admittance to the lens. As a matter of
interest, Fig. 11b illustrates the condition with the inner
surface beyond the two foci.
It is possible to alleviate to an extent the effects of
multiple reections by applying a matching layer to the
lens surface, bearing in mind that it needs to be tapered
away from the apex of the lens. The problems associated
2334 LENS ANTENNAS
with the analysis of lenses in the millimeterwave and
submilllimeterwave-region, are addressed by van der
Vorst et al., and use is made of a combination of geometric
and physical optics in an efcient body of revolution nite-
difference time-domain methods [44]. Integrated lenses
can be designed to have multiple beams [45].
Indoor wireless communications are becoming increas-
ingly important as technology expands and the cost of
integrated microwave circuits drop. Dielectric lenses that
produce shaped beams for the reduction of multipath
phenomena and predetermined coverage patterns have
been designed and evaluated [46].
4.2. Fresnel Zone Plate Lenses
Unfortunately, the simple Fresnel lens described in Sec-
tion 1.6 has very poor efciency; gures of 815% are
common for lenses with alternate opaque and transparent
rings. Consequently the reective or opaque rings are
replaced by rings that serve to reverse the phase. Black
and Wiltse [47] achieve this phase reversal by making use
of annular rings cut into a single dielectric, or by means of
layers of different dielectrics, as shown in Fig. 17a. Lenses
with annular slots suffer from shadow blockage as de-
picted in Fig. 17b. Petosa and Itippiboon [48] describe a
lens constructed in such a fashion, and measured an
aperture efciency of 63% for a lens of 194 mm diameter
and f/D of 0.25. Note that the diameter of the lens is
determined by the number of Fresnel rings, 12 in this
case. The gain was 23 dBi.
A method of construction with each full-wave zone of
the lens consisting of four quarter-wave subzones, in turn
consisting of concentric dielectric rings of equal thickness,
but different permittivity, is described by Hristov and
Herben [49]. They constructed practical lenses with an
aperture efciency of more than 50% at 60 GHz. In order
to achieve the correct phase shift through the rings, the
dielectric constants have to be, respectively, e
r
1
=1,
e
r
2
=6:25, e
r
3
=4, and e
r
4
=2:25. This corresponds to phase
shifts of DF
t
=01, 901, 1801, 2701. Full design information
is provided in Ref. 49.
An alternative method of constructing a lens without
grooves is proposed by Petosa and Ittipiboon [50], who
constructed a lens from a single slab of dielectric. The
appropriate dielectric constants are realized by perforat-
ing the dielectric material. The lens then consists of a slab
of dielectric material with annular rings where the mate-
rial is penetrated by a lattice of holes. The effective
dielectric constant for such a medium is given by
e
eff
=e
r
(1 a) a (43)
where a is the lling factor, given by
a =
p
2
3
_
d
s
_ _
2
(44)
The holes have a diameter of d and lattice spacing s.
Analysis procedures for determining the performance
of lenses include the uniform and geometrical theory of
diffraction for metal ring lenses on dielectric, and in the
case of the quarter-wave planar lens antenna, ray tracing
combined with diffraction theory is used.
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LENS ANTENNAS 2335
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Vol. 4, June 2227, 2003, pp. 514517.
LINEAR ANTENNAS
ASOKE K. BHATTACHARYYA
Lincoln University
Historically, using a piece of radiating straight wire as an
aerial, or antenna, was a natural choice for wireless com-
munications. This radiating piece of straight wire without
curvature is the linear antenna. A simple example of a
linear antenna is a two-wire transmission line carrying
equal currents in opposite directions and hence no resul-
tant radiation. A two-wire transmission line may be bent
to create an efcient radiator such as a dipole. The linear
antennas have been treated in numerous references. Some
of them are in Refs. 113. We will describe key features of
linear antennas in this article.
1. SOME RELEVANT TERMS
Before we proceed to discuss linear antennas, we need to
dene and discuss certain terms in accordance with the
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
standard definitions of antenna terminology.
2336 LINEAR ANTENNAS
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LEAKY MODES AND HIGH-FREQUENCY

EFFECTS IN MICROWAVE INTEGRATED

), toward the forward endre

Figure 1. (a) Example of relationship between the power ow

Figure 15. R-2R lens.

Figure 16. Luneburg lens.

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