A novel design of monolithically integrated phased array antenna employing 4-bit DMTL phase shifter

Abstract

This paper presents the design of an electronically scanning phased array antenna which is constituted using 130 RF MEMS capacitive switches conflated with a series of linearly placed micro strip rectangular inset feed patch antennas and a corporate feed network. The design and analysis is performed in Ansoft HFSS (version 13.0). As the urge of obtaining high radiation pattern, light weight, low cost and better performance over wide range of frequencies, the micro strip antennas is still in demand. A phased array antenna using high-Q metal-insulator-metal capacitors which are intended as loading elements in the phase shifter have been designed in this context. The simulated result sights the designed 4-bit DMTL phase shifter which provides nearly 22.5°/45°/90°/180° phase shifts for different combination of MEMS switches. The design is optimized for Ku band at 15 GHz and the return loss for the phased array antenna is annexed to be -27.41dB. A highly integrated structure has been designed on silicon substrate having an area of 3.1×1.9cm2 only.