Miniaturizing of a distributed MEMS impedance matching network

Abstract

This paper shows a Micro-Electro-Mechanical-Systems (MEMS) impedance matching network based on a distributed MEMS transmission line (DMTL) for wireless communication devices operating in the frequency range from 1.8 GHz to 3.6 GHz. In the proposed design, the capacitive MEMS switches are periodically located on a meandered slow-wave (SW) structure, whose slow wave effect is analytically calculated to reduce the minimum operating frequency of the network. Using this demonstrated transmission line, the size of the impedance matching network is minimized while providing a good impedance matching performance in terms of impedance coverage on the Smith chart.