140 GHz High-Gain LTCC-Integrated Transmit-Array Antenna Using a Wideband SIW Aperture-Coupling Phase Delay Structure

This paper presents the complete design of a wideband transmit-array (TA) antenna with high gain and high efficiency for D-band applications based on the low-temperature co-fired ceramic technology. The proposed unit cell is composed of a pair of wideband magnetoelectric dipoles as the receive/transmit elements, together with a substrate-integrated waveguide (SIW) aperture-coupling transmission structure for independent phase adjustability. A 360 degrees phase coverage is obtained by the proposed phasing element, and its phase response curves are nearly parallel within a broad frequency band, which indicates a wideband performance. To verify the design, the fabricated prototype is measured by using a vector network analyzer in a terahertz compact-range anechoic chamber. The measured peak gain is 33.45 dBi at 150 GHz with the aperture efficiency of 44.03%, and the measured 3 dB gain bandwidth is 124-158 GHz (24.29%). The good radiation performance ensures that the proposed SIW aperture-coupling TA antenna is a promising candidate for D-band applications.