IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 59, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2011
I. INTRODUCTION
Manuscript received March 08, 2011; revised July 15, 2011; accepted July
29, 2011. Date of publication September 26, 2011; date of current version
November 16, 2011. This work was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).
The authors are with the Institut fr Hochfrequenztechnik, Technische
Universitt HamburgHarburg, 21073 Hamburg, Germany (e-mail: johannes.mueller@tuhh.de).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TMTT.2011.2165961
apertures in the ground plane [7], [8]. Stepped-impedance approaches [9], [10] rely on internal reflections to achieve port
isolation.
The second category relies on reactive components connected
to the coupled lines. The use of inductive elements in series to
the ports was originally proposed in [11]. Design equations were
derived in [12] and further developed in [13]. Shunt inductances
were recently considered in [14]. The achievable compensation
with all these inductive methods is, however, relatively narrowband. Much more common is to place a capacitance between the
coupled (microstrip) lines at each end of the coupler. Ideally,
this affects only the odd mode and slows it down. This method
was first presented by Schaller [15], who also introduced an
approximate design equation for the compensating capacitance
[11]. Kajfez used a similar formulation and was first to account
for the effect of a parasitic even mode capacitance [16]. Thus
far, however, the analytical formulation was approximate and
valid for loose coupling only. Dydyk improved this method by
deriving an exact design equation for both the odd-mode capacitance and the modified odd-mode impedance of the coupled
lines [17]. The latter is necessary since the capacitances effectively change the characteristic impedance of the odd mode. The
presence of a parasitic even-mode capacitance, however, was
not taken into account in [17]. In all methods, the capacitances
connect the lines at the end of the coupler. Dydyk also derived
formulas for a single capacitance at the center of the coupler
[18]. In this case, however, the compensation is more narrowband.
In this study, we derive design equations for lumped capacitances that are placed at arbitrary positions, but still
symmetrically, along the coupler, thereby maintaining its
twofold symmetry. This simplifies the synthesis and ensures
quadrature. The parasitic even-mode capacitance is taken into
account as sketched in Fig. 1. In contrast to previous work, it
is assumed to depend on the odd-mode capacitance instead of
being constant, as this is more realistic. This paper is organized
as follows. Section II describes the model and outlines the
approach. In Section III, we analyze in detail the compensation
by means of two capacitances and determine their optimum
position. Section IV extends the rigorous design to the case
of three, and generalizing the previous findings, an arbitrary
number of capacitances. Finally, measurements results are
reported.
II. THEORY
A. Image Parameter Approach
The approach is based on the so-called image method, a classical network description used for the synthesis of filters and
= 1 2 ...
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Fig. 2. Image method representation of a: (a) general and (b) symmetric twoport.
In the case of homogeneous media, (3) is always fulfilled, independently of frequency. Otherwise, a compensating structure
yielding (3) at the design frequency is needed.
According to the second condition, the coupler impedance
(4)
has to match the system (or reference) impedance
(e.g.,
and
are the even- and odd-mode
50 ). Here,
(image) impedances, respectively.
A third design condition follows from the nominal coupling
factor
(1a)
(5)
(1b)
(1c)
being the image attenuation in neper and
being
with
the image phase in radian. In the case of symmetric two-ports,
the equations reduce to
(2a)
(2b)
C. Coupler Compensation
The coupled line model with twofold symmetry is depicted
in Fig. 1. Exemplarily, three capacitances are shown. Here,
is the capacitance desired for compensation, whereas
represents the parasitic even-mode
capacitance. Thus, the odd mode sees both in parallel. The
corresponding circuit for mode is depicted in Fig. 3(a).
The symmetry lines are preserved in this arrangement.
Consequently, the image impedance seen at the port(s) can be
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 59, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2011
(8)
The even/odd mode inhomogeneity is characterized through
(9)
with the effective permittivities . The electrical lengths of the
two modes are thus related through
(10)
Finally, let
with
Fig. 3. (a) Mode i schematic of coupled lines with three symmetrically placed
capacitances. (b) Corresponding image parameter representation. (c) Equivalent
ideal transmission line.
(11)
for
for
(6)
and
(12)
To further reduce the parameter space, the different coupled
line sections are assumed to have equal cross section and thus
impedance
for
for
(7)
(13)
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Next, (17a)(17d) is inserted into (2a) and the remaining conditions (4) and (5) are applied. This yields, after some manipulation, the following expressions for the even- and odd-mode
impedances of the coupled line sections:
(20)
(21)
(15)
(22)
(16)
the
(23)
(17a)
Again,
(17b)
(17c)
(17d)
(18)
(or
B. Some Limitations
The inhomogeneity depends on the geometry of the coupled
line structure and the dielectric property of the medium. In the
. It increases with
case of microstrip lines, for example,
thickness and permittivity of the substrate, as well as with
.
the coupling factor , and may reach values of up to
Other transmission line structures, such as broadside coupled
lines on suspended substrate, may exhibit inhomogeneities of
, which vary in a much wider range [23].
Following the previous derivation, compensation is theoretically possible for any . The type of inhomgeneity imposes,
however, some constraints on the compensating capacitances.
From (21) or (23), it follows:
Type 1:
(24)
Type 2:
(25)
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 59, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2011
= 1 12
= 2
= 1 12
= 2
0:5, and = 1.
Thus, the upper (lower) limit of
for Type 1 Type 2
is determined by the coupling factor through
. Weaker (stronger) coupling therefore relaxes
the constraints on the capacitance ratio for Type 1 Type 2 .
This makes compensation easier.
In the remainder of this work, only edge-coupled microstrip
lines are considered. In this case, the required capacitance values
increase with , as will be shown in Section III-C. Depending
on the farication technique, large capacitance values might be
difficult to realize. In the following analysis, we choose
and
, which are typical values for coupled
microstrip lines. For reasons of comparability, these values are
kept throughout this paper.
C. Analysis
To illustrate the above, several examples are studied. Compensation is performed at
. Fig. 4 shows the compensating odd-mode susceptance versus its position for different
coupling levels. The value of the susceptance grows strongly
with coupling and decreases when the position approaches the
center of the coupler (increasing ). Fig. 5 depicts the normalized even- and odd-mode impedances. They may significantly
differ from the image impedances. In Fig. 6, the scattering parameters of a 15-dB coupler are shown for different values of
and for the uncompensated case as well. They are plotted versus
the normalized frequency.
Independently of , perfect compensation
is achieved at , as intended. The broadband behavior, howcompared to
or
ever, is about 20 dB better for
. Maximum coupling
occurs at about
for both
and the uncompensated case, while it is shifted to lower
= 0, =
dB
(26)
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=0 =05
1
=1
= 10
CAPACITANCES
The number of capacitances is now increased, the placement still ensuring symmetry, as described in Section II-D. Exemplarily, we consider compensation with three capacitances,
and to explore the limits, with an arbitrary number . To restrict the number of unknowns, we assume
, as
= 1 12
= 0:3.
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 59, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2011
as a func-
=0
TABLE I
GEOMETRIC PARAMETERS OF THE FABRICATED COUPLERS
= 0:5
Fig. 15. Coupler layout with three capacitances ( = 0:33). Measured scattering parameters and extracted image parameters versus frequency.
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dB instead of
dB. The
and
reasons for this can be manifold. On the one hand, the actual
are slightly smaller than assumed in
values of and
the simulation. On the other hand, instead of being lumped elements, as presumed in the analysis, the realized capacitances
have finite length. Full-wave simulation with interdigital structures yields the same qualitative behavior of with respect to
and the number of capacitances . It is, however, very time consuming and does not perfectly converge due to numerical noise.
It should also be mentioned that, owing to the distributed nature
is not realizable. Thus,
of the realized capacitors, the case
the fractional position of the capacitor with respect to its center
.
corresponds to
Compensation with three and 16 capacitances (Figs. 15
dB
and 16) yields minimum directivities of
and
dB, respectively. While these are good
results for broadband compensated coupler, the theoretically
dB (Fig. 9) and
achievable performances of
dB (Fig. 11) could not be reached. Several limitations cause this difference. First, the measurement
uncertainty, as determined from the redundant multiline thru-reflect-line (TRL) calibration [24], is around 45 dB, which can
be considered as the accuracy limit for the directivity measurement. Secondly, the in-house fabrication process exhibits
etching tolerances of around 8 m. The resulting variations
of the coupler geometry have a nonnegligible influence on the
directivity at such low signal levels. Finally, losses may also
have some effect.
VI. CONCLUSION
An accurate design synthesis for the phase velocity compensation of coupled lines by means of parallel capacitances was
investigated for directional-coupler applications. In contrast
to previous approaches, an arbitrary number of capacitances
was considered. Their positions were optimized with respect to
bandwidth-directivity performance. Significant improvements
were demonstrated. The parasitic even-mode capacitance was
taken into account throughout the analysis. Compensated
couplers with two, three, and 16 interdigital capacitances were
fabricated and measured. Due to measurement uncertainties and
fabrication tolerances, the measurements do not quite match the
predictions. Still, the achieved performance with directivities of
% is, to the authors
about 40 dB over an FBW of
knowledge, unmatched in literature. Thus, the measurement
results confirm the novel compensation approach. Ongoing
investigations deal with the distributed nature of the interdigital
capacitors and its inclusion in the optimization process.
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MICROWAVE THEORY AND TECHNIQUES, VOL. 59, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2011
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