Effect of Actuation electrode design on RF Performance of RF MEMS shunt switch

Abstract

Reconfigurability in RF and microwave circuits can be achieved using RF switches. MEMS switches in RF provide high isolation, better return loss while consuming negligible power. These switches can control the flow of RF signals in the transmission line. The actuation electrode regulates the movement of a MEMS switch. Therefore, it becomes an important task to configure the actuation electrode to have a low impact on the RF signal. In this article, we have designed a unique configuration of actuation electrode biasing to achieve low loss and high RF performance. This designed configuration provides high performance and reduces the size of the structure due to change in the inductance and capacitance of the transmission line by the defect grounded structures (DGS). Insertion loss is 0.1419 dB, and the Return loss is 27.20 dB at 20GHz. Simulation is done in HFSS (Ansys). RF performance on the various substrate has also been observed to authenticate the design.