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2394 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 65, NO.

10, OCTOBER 2016

Free-Space Time Domain Position Insensitive


Technique for Simultaneous Measurement of
Complex Permittivity and Thickness of
Lossy Dielectric Samples
Zubair Akhter, Student Member, IEEE, and Mohammad Jaleel Akhtar, Senior Member, IEEE

Abstract— A novel time domain measurement technique is desired bandwidth (BW), and other essential requirements [2].
proposed to facilitate the simultaneous measurement of electri- The microwave and RF material characterization methods can
cal properties (complex relative permittivity) and geometrical be broadly classified as resonant and nonresonant types. The
parameters (thickness) of the material under test (MUT). The
overall process is noninvasive and noncontacting, which uses the resonant methods are found to have better sensitivity as com-
measured scattering data of the MUT in the equivalent time pared with the nonresonant methods, but are usually suitable
domain or spatial domain. The effective time domain scattering for low loss materials providing measurement at some specific
data are employed to detect the primary and secondary peaks of frequency point [3]–[6]. On the other hand, the nonresonant
the overall reflection and transmission coefficients. To this end, methods can usually provide wideband RF characterization
a novel algorithm is proposed to obtain the complex permittivity
and thickness of the MUT in terms of extracted reflection and with good amount of accuracy, and are valid for materials
transmission power peaks. From the practical point of view, the with moderate losses [6]. The nonresonant methods, which
main advantage of the proposed scheme is that one avoids the mostly require measurements of reflection and transmission
complicated calibration procedure normally required to define coefficient data, can be broadly classified into the guided trans-
the reference plane. For increasing the accuracy of the overall mission line [7]–[10], and the free-space method [11]–[24].
reconstruction process, an automated optimization procedure
based on parameter sensitivity analysis is proposed, which uses It may be noted that the free-space methods are quite con-
standard time gating procedure to implement the corresponding venient from the user point of view especially in the higher
direct problem. The proposed technique is validated by extracting frequency region, as practically no sample preparation is
the relative permittivity, the dielectric loss (effective conduc- required. The free-space methods can, in principle, be further
tivity), and the thickness of various standard materials, such classified under the frequency (spectral) domain and time
as polyethylene, Plexiglas, PVC, mortar, nylon, and so on, and
comparing the extracted data with their values available in the (spatial) domains depending upon the methodology adopted
literature. for the reconstruction of dielectric properties in terms of
measured data. The frequency domain free-space methods
Index Terms— Dielectric material characterization, effective
conductivity determination, Fourier transform, free-space usually require the complicated calibration procedure, which
measurement, material measurement, relative permittivity sometimes becomes difficult due to nonavailability of accurate
measurement, remote material characterization, time domain standards (conventional standard, i.e., open short through) for
reflectometery, wave propagation, wideband. nonguided media.
The traditional time domain material testing methods are
I. I NTRODUCTION
usually based on analytical formulations, and appear to provide

I N RECENT years, low cost, simple, and effective radio


frequency (RF) dielectric testing technique of materials has
been of much interest by researchers because of its importance
a viable cost effective solution for the broadband microwave
material characterization [7], [8], [25]. The main advantage of
the time domain method is that it uses a simple calibration
in many practical situations. The material testing technique setup, and quite often, the involved calibration procedures
in the RF and microwave frequency band finds applications used inherently in frequency domain approach can be avoided.
in food engineering, medical diagnostic, agriculture industry, This is facilitated with the help of standard time gating
civil engineering, and bioengineering [1]. Based on the nature procedures, which can separate the scattering data of the
of applications, the dielectric materials can be characterized test specimen from that of the background medium. In order
using various methods satisfying the sample dimensions, the to further ease the calibration procedure for time domain
Manuscript received November 14, 2015; revised May 8, 2016; accepted free-space measurements, various specialized techniques have
May 31, 2016. Date of publication July 7, 2016; date of current version been proposed in recent years to characterize the dielectric
September 12, 2016. This work was supported by the Department of Science materials [12]–[24].
and Technology, New Delhi, India, under Grant SERB/EE/20130128. The
Associate Editor coordinating the review process was Dr. Sasan Bakhtiari. It should be noted than even the aforementioned spe-
The authors are with the Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT Kanpur, cialized time domain techniques require an additional refer-
Kanpur 208016, India (e-mail: zuakhter@iitk.ac.in). ence measurement for performing the calibration procedure.
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available
online at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org. Most of these methods usually require the perfect electric
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TIM.2016.2581398 conductor (PEC) as the standard reference material [17]–[24],
0018-9456 © 2016 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See http://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
AKHTER AND AKHTAR: FREE-SPACE TIME DOMAIN POSITION INSENSITIVE TECHNIQUE 2395

and quite often a good conductor plate is being utilized in the


place of PEC. However, the calibration procedure requiring
the metal plate as a reference material might not be suitable
for online monitoring of material properties due to several
reasons. First, the metal plate should be placed at the reference
plane of the material under test (MUT), which basically means
that the test sample should be taken out of its place thus
causing inconvenience under practical scenarios. Second, the
calibration procedure then becomes position sensitive implying
that the accuracy of the reconstruction will be affected if the
MUT reference plane is shifted due to some reason from the
Fig. 1. Schematic representation of the microwave characterization of
reference plane. Finally, the overall reconstruction procedure material.
might also be sensitive to the electrical properties of the
reference material, such as its conductivity, surface roughness, the dielectric properties in terms of the time domain scattering
and so on. data is given. The numerical validation and the sensitivity
It is mainly due to above-mentioned reasons that an equiv- analysis are presented in Section III with the help of the
alent time domain or spatial domain method is proposed here 3-D full wave simulator, the CST Microwave studio. The
to determine the dielectric properties and thickness of the test actual measurement configuration and performance assess-
specimen, which does not require any specialized calibration ments of proposed technique are conferred in Section IV,
scheme for measurements carried out in free space. In other where the self-decisive optimization procedure is also
words, the proposed method now does not depend upon the described. The conclusions are stated in Section V.
material properties of the reference, which might otherwise
affect the overall accuracy of the reconstruction. In addi- II. M ETHODOLOGY
tion, the proposed scheme does not require any information
A. Problem Formulation
about the thickness of the specimen in order to get electrical
properties of the MUT. As a matter of fact, the thickness The MUT is assumed to be illuminated with the transverse
of the test sample is also determined using the proposed electromagnetic (TEM) wave using the proposed microwave
procedure in addition to the electrical properties using the measurement configuration system, as shown in Fig. 1. The
proposed approach. To the best of our knowledge, such kind MUT with the relative permittivity (εrt ), the effective electrical
of equivalent time domain free-space method, where both the conductivity (σt ), and the thickness (dt ) is placed in free
dielectric properties and the thickness of the test specimen space, such that the TEM wave is incident normally over
are determined without requiring any reference calibration, the MUT. The term effective conductivity is mainly used here,
has not been presented earlier in the literature. Hence, the a mathematical representation of the dielectric loss indicating
proposed technique, in principle, is different from other time that the constant conductivity model can be used to represent
domain techniques presented earlier in the literature, which the dielectric losses. The effective conductivity is used quite
usually utilize a reference material measurement (PEC or often to represent effective dielectric losses due to static and
highly conducting material) and provide only the electrical alternating fields. However, it is to be noted here that many
properties of the test specimen [18]–[25]. The closed form dielectric materials (glass and plastics) possess very low values
relations derived here relate the material properties with var- of static conductivities, i.e., alternating conductivity dominate
ious reflection/transmission power peaks obtained after trans- and a considerable amount of energy gets consumed when
forming the measured scattering parameters into equivalent a dielectric is subjected to alternating fields as compared
time domain. In addition to the closed form analytical relation- with its static counterpart [26]. Mathematically, the effective
ships, an automatic optimization algorithm is also proposed conductivity can be related with the effective tangent loss of
here, which directly compares the scattering coefficients of the material using the following expression [26]:
the test specimen in order to increase the overall accuracy of σt (effective conductivity)
the reconstruction. tan δt (effective loss tangent) =
2π f ε0 εrt
From the practical perspective, the proposed method (1)
employs a configuration where the MUT is placed in middle
of two-antenna arrangement. Using this arrangement, the time where ε0 = 8.854e − 12 is the free-space permittivity and
corresponding to the first transmission gives an idea of possible f represents the frequency of operation. Meanwhile, the local
occurrence of the first desired reflection from the test sample, voltage reflection coefficient of the test media (t ) and the
and hence, the unwanted reflections from other sources, such local voltage transmission coefficient of test media (Tt ) with
as the antenna region, can be minimized. The problem of reference to background medium are also shown in Fig. 1.
background reflection is removed with the help of absorbing The configuration shown in Fig. 1 represents the most gen-
boundary conditions by carrying out the measurement in the eral scenario where the reflected power is measured in the
anechoic environment. background medium, having relative permittivity (εr0 ) and
This paper is organized as follows. In Section II, the detailed effective conductivity (σ0 ), at a distance d1 from the MUT.
description of the proposed theoretical algorithm to determine In a similar manner, the transmitted power is measured at the
2396 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 65, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2016

expressed as

Pr1 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt , d1 , Pinc ) = PL1 R1 A1 u(t − τ1 )Pinc (3)

where
PL1 (d1 ) two way path loss between the
interface I1 and I f ;
R1 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt ) local reflection from the interface I f
of MUT;
τ1 (εr0 , σ0 , d1 ) time corresponding to primary
reflection from interface I f ; u(t) unit
Fig. 2. Bounce diagram for the geometry shown in Fig. 1. A transient wave step function.
undergoes an infinite number of transmission and reflection at the interfaces.
The second reflection, i.e., the reflection from the back
interface of MUT (Ib ), observed by TR1 , as shown in Fig. 2,
opposite side of the interface at a distance d2 from the MUT. can also be expressed as
The incident, reflected, and transmitted power components
are represented as Pinc , Pr , and Pt , respectively. It is to be Pr2 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt , d1 , dt , Pinc ) = PL2 R2 A2 u(t − τ2 )Pinc
noted here that the background medium is considered to be (4)
lossless and dispersion-less throughout the formulation, which
can represent the free space in most of the cases. In this paper, where
various primary and secondary reflection and transmission
PL2 (d1 , dt ) two way path loss between the
power quantities are directly taken from the vector network
interface I1 and interface Ib ;
analyzer (VNA), which basically makes use of the complex
R2 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt ) two transmission (i.e., forward
scattering data (both magnitude and phase) to convert them
and reverse way) at the
into the equivalent time domain using the standard inverse
interface I f and a reflection
fast Fourier transform (IFFT) routines. Hence, although the
from interface Ib ;
VNA makes use of both magnitude and phase information of
A2 (εrt , σt , dt ) material absorption;
the scattering data, the present formulation makes use of the
τ2 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt , d1 , dt ) time corresponding to the
power quantity only for determining the material properties
second reflection.
and the thickness of the test specimen.
In a similar manner, the primary and secondary transmitted
B. Algorithm Description power peaks can be expressed as
The typical reflection and the transmission bounce diagram
Pt 1 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt , d1 , dt , d2 , Pinc ) = PL3 R3 A3 u(t − τ3 )Pinc
in the time domain representing the reflected and transmitted
powers from the test media are shown in Fig. 2, where (5)
S1 and S2 represent the antenna/sensor elements being respon- Pt 2 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt , d1 , dt , d2 , Pinc ) = PL4 R4 A4 u(t − τ4 )Pinc
sible for transmission and reception of the RF power. (6)
The reflection from or transmission through the test
media (i ) can be expressed in the following generalized
where
form:
PL3 (d1 , dt , d2 ) and
i = PLi Ri Ai u(t − τi )Pinc . (2) PL4 (d1 , dt , d2 ) path losses;
The term PLi in the above expression describes the propa- R3 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt ) transmission factor at the interface
gation condition, i.e., the path loss, which models the actual I f and Ib successively;
propagation condition in different wave propagation situations R4 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt ) transmission factor at the interface
viz., the planar, the cylindrical, and the spherical [19]. Here, I f and Ib and reflection factor at the
for the sake of simplicity, a plane EM wave incident nor- interface Ib and I f , respectively;
mally over the test media is assumed. The term Ri considers A3 (εrt , σt , dt ) and
various reflection and transmission factors when the wave A4 (εrt , σt , dt ) material absorption;
propagates through the test media whereas Ai models the τ3 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt ,
effective absorption through the test media. The term u(t − τi ) d1 , dt , d2 ) and
is the unit step function, which signifies the received waveform τ4 (εr0 , εrt , σ0 , σt ,
with τi representing the arrival time of various reflection and d1 , dt , d2 ) time corresponding to the first and
transmission signals at sensor/antenna. the second transmission, respectively.
The first reflection sensed by the receiver, i.e., reflection The magnitude of reflection and transmission peaks
from the front interface (I f ), observed by S1 in Fig. 2 can be described earlier in terms of incident power assuming a plane
AKHTER AND AKHTAR: FREE-SPACE TIME DOMAIN POSITION INSENSITIVE TECHNIQUE 2397

wave propagation can also be written in the following form: from the equivalent time domain representation of
S-parameter data obtained in Step 1.
Pr1 ∼
= |t | Pinc
2
(7)
  Step 3: Finally, with the help of (10)–(14), the values of
1
Pr2 ∼
= |t |2 (1 − |t |2 )2 exp −2σt η0 √ dt Pinc (8) the relative permittivity (εrt ), the effective electrical
εrt conductivity (σt ), and the thickness (dt ) of the test
 
1
Pt 1 ∼
specimen are determined.
= (1 − |t |2 )2 exp −σt η0 √ dt Pinc (9)
εrt The proposed approach makes use of time corresponding to
 
1 occurrence of the first transmission peak in order to identify
Pt 2 ∼
= (1 − |t |2 )2 |t |4 exp −3σt η0 √ dt Pinc (10) various power terms required to reconstruct the dielectric
εrt
properties and thickness of the test specimen. The problem
where η0 = 377
(free-space intrinsic impedance) and Pinc is of background reflections, if any, can be resolved with the
the reference incident power, as shown in Fig. 1. Pr1 and Pr2 help of absorbing boundaries by facilitating the measurements
represent the powers reflected from front and back interface in the anechoic environment as discussed earlier. The time of
of the test slab whereas Pt 1 and Pt 2 represent the direct path occurrence of various power peaks can be verified by placing
transmission and the consecutive transmission in time. a metal plate at the material interface. It should be, however,
Equations (7)–(10) are taken as approximate in the sense noted that the metal plate is required here only for verification
that the term PLi in all these equations is taken as 1 indicating and not for any reference measurement.
a perfect plane wave or a TEM wave. Now, it is well known
that the perfect plane wave concept is always an approxima- C. Limitations on Bandwidth and Number
tion, since under practical situation, the phase front over the of Frequency Samples
full cross section of the test specimen might not represent
The BW (pulse rise time) and the number of frequency
an ideal plane. Equations (7)–(10) would be exact when the
sample are very crucial parameters in order to get accurate
measurements are carried out in a guided medium representing
reconstruction of the properties of test specimen using the
a TEM wave.
proposed approach. The proposed technique makes use of
From (7)–(10)
 various primary and secondary reflection/transmission peaks
Pr1 Pt 2 |t |2 to determine the properties of MUT, and the time separation
= =k (11) between these peaks directly depend on BW of the measured
Pt 1 Pr2 (1 − |t |2 )
scattering data. Therefore, a compromise has to be made here
where k is a constant, which can be determined using various between the thickness of MUT and BW of the scattering data
reflection and transmission power peaks. Equation (11) can such that various reflection and transmission peaks can be
then be solved to determine the magnitude of the reflection detected in the equivalent time domain. In other words, a
coefficient with the constraint that |t | < 1. minimum BW is required to resolve two adjacent interfaces
Once the magnitude of the local reflection coefficient |t | (i.e., axial resolution) of the test specimen. The axial resolution
is determined, the relative permittivity and the thickness of δz in the range direction is determined approximately by the
test material can determined with the help of the following signal BW of the measured RF signal [27]
expression:
  c 10.71
1 + |t | 2 dmin = δz (mm) ≈ = √ . (15)
εrt = (12) 2 × BW εrt
1 − |t |
Accordingly, a large signal BW results in an equivalent short
c ∗ τ
dt = √ (13) pulse duration and hence provides a high range resolution.
2 εrt In most of the network analyzer, the number of points for the
where τ represents the time delay between Pr1 and Pr2 , and time domain representation is directly linked to the number
c is the velocity of EM wave in free space. After determining of sample/points in frequency sweep (equal in most cases).
the permittivity and the thickness, the conductivity of the slab Therefore, reducing the number of points in the frequency
can be computed using domain also results into less number of points in the time
   domain representation [28], which ultimately limits the ability
1 ε0 εr Pr1
σt ∼
= ln (1 − |t |2 )2 or of the procedure to detect and resolve various peaks in the
2dt μ0 Pr2
   delay domain. For example, if the spectral domain measure-
1 ε0 εr Pt 1
= ln |t |4 . (14) ments are carried out over a BW, then the procedure cannot
2dt μ0 Pt 2 properly characterize a material having relative permittivity εrt
The derivation of (14) is facilitated with the help of (7)–(10). if its thickness is below the minimum value given in (15).
The details of the proposed inversion algorithm can be The intermediate frequency (IF) BW is another important
explained using the following steps. parameter in the VNA measurements, which basically cor-
Step 1 (Optional): The measured scattering data (Fig. 1) responds to the BW of the IF filter. The smaller IF BW
are converted into equivalent time domain using the implies less broadband noise, which increases the effective
IFFT routines of the VNA. dynamic range available for measurement. For lower permit-
Step 2: The second step involves the extraction of various tivity samples, the magnitude of the reflection coefficient is
parameters, such as Pr1 , Pr2 , Pt 1 , Pt 2 , and τ , low, and hence, the detection of various higher orders peaks,
2398 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 65, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2016

TABLE I
R ECONSTRUCTION OF MUT’s PARAMETERS

such as Pr2 and Pt 2 , becomes difficult. In order to detect these The following observation can be made from Table I.
peaks, the reference noise label should be considerably low, 1) The proposed technique can estimate the relative per-
which can be achieved by lowering the value of IF BW during mittivity of various standard samples having different
measurement. It should, however, be mentioned that lowering dielectric contrasts with respect to the background media
the IF BW also slows the overall measurement process. having a typical accuracy of 98% or more.
2) The thickness of the various test samples can also be
III. N UMERICAL VALIDATION accurately determined with a typical accuracy of 98%
A. Simulation Procedure or more.
Before testing the validity of the proposed technique against 3) The proposed technique can also be used to evaluate the
the experimental data, it is tested against the independent effective conductivity of various lossy dielectrics, and
simulation data to closely observe the accuracy and range of the typical accuracy can be quantified as follows.
validity of the proposed technique. For this purpose, the CST a) The lossy samples with σt  10−3 or more can be
microwave studio is used to simulate the actual configuration, characterized with a typical accuracy ranging from
as shown in Fig. 1. The S-parameter is calculated for the 99% to 97%.
frequency range of 26–40 GHz. In order to satisfy the plane b) The dielectric samples with σt  10−4 or less can
wave condition, the boundary conditions are chosen, such be characterized with a typical accuracy ranging
that the structure supports the TEM mode of propagation as from 90% to 85%.
its dominant mode. In the present case, the parallel plate The sensitivity analysis has been done here for the MUT’s
waveguide boundary condition (i.e., electric and magnetic parameter in order to find out the applicability of the proposed
boundaries along the mutually perpendicular faces) is used to technique, and to obtain range of parameters values for which
facilitate the TEM mode of propagation. The waveguide ports the optimum accuracy can be achieved.
are kept at a distance of 20 × λ f c from the MUT surface in
both the directions, where λ f c is the free-space wavelength B. Sensitivity and Error Analysis
at a center frequency of 33 GHz of band of interest. The In order to obtain the sensitivity of the proposed method, a
thickness dt of the MUT is ranging from 25–30 mm while the detailed parametric analysis is carried out in this paper with
cross-sectional dimensions, i.e., length and width, are taken respect to the electrical properties, i.e., the relative permittivity
as 15 × λ f c . and the effective electrical conductivity. To this end, the test
The itemized inversion algorithm presented in Section II has sample’s electrical properties parametric variations against the
been applied on the simulated S-parameters. It is to be noted measurable quantities, i.e., Pr1 , Pr2 , Pt 1 , Pt 2 , and τ , are
here that the number of frequency samples plays an important closely analyzed. The variations in the primary/secondary
role as described earlier, and it is desirable to have more reflected and transmitted powers, i.e., Pr1 , Pt 1 /Pr2 , Pt 2 , with
number of frequency samples for accurate peak detection. The respect to the relative permittivity εrt of the MUT are pre-
number of frequency samples and the mesh cells considered sented in Fig. 3.
in the current simulation are 10 000 and 2 862 250 (after In Fig. 3, the associated scales of primary and secondary
symmetry plane reduction), respectively. For the validation of reflected and transmitted powers are represented along the left
the proposed concept, a number of standard samples (with and the right sides of the y-axis, respectively. The following
low-to-high dielectric contrasts with respect to free-space observations can be made from the detailed analysis.
background) were used from the CST material library. The 1) The proposed algorithm is well suited for low as well as
actual and the reconstructed relative permittivity, effective high dielectric contrast objects. However, the sensitivity
conductivity, and thickness of various standard materials are is more for samples with low dielectric contrast as
tabulated in Table I. The reconstructed material properties compared with those having higher dielectric contrasts.
shown in Table I are obtained directly using the proposed set 2) The powers variation graph can play an impor-
of closed form equations without any optimization. tant role during the optimization process (discussed
AKHTER AND AKHTAR: FREE-SPACE TIME DOMAIN POSITION INSENSITIVE TECHNIQUE 2399

are quite important for the proposed optimization scheme


presented later in this paper.
As discussed earlier, the BW plays an important role, since
the probability of detection of higher order peaks directly
depends on the BW. In case of low BW, or where the sample
thickness is smaller than the minimum thickness required
as mentioned in (15), the primary and secondary reflection
and transmission peaks are merged together in time, thereby
making the detection of all the four required peaks quite
difficult. The quality of reconstruction near to this physical
limit is analyzed here, so that the optimum thickness can
be predicted in order to have good quality reconstruction.
For this purpose, a simulation has been performed and the
reconstructed values are plotted against the original values for
different sample thicknesses. The outcome of this analysis can
found in Fig. 5.
Fig. 3. Parametric analysis of reflected and transmitted powers with respect The minimum thickness required for a typical test sample
to relative permittivity of media under test as shown in the figure (dt = 15 mm
and σt = 0 S/m). (Arlon 600, εrt = 6, and σt = 0.01168) is roughly around
4.37 mm. When the thickness of the test sample is less
than this limit, both the primary and secondary reflection and
transmission peaks are merged together, giving rise to the
dark zone. However, when the thickness of the test sample is
increased from this limit, as shown in Fig. 5, the corresponding
associated error becomes less.
IV. M EASUREMENT AND O PTIMIZATION
A. Free-Space Measurement
The proposed analytical technique requires the measurement
of various reflection and transmission power peaks of the
MUT using the free-space configuration shown in Fig. 6.
The algorithm presented in Section III is then utilized to
calculate the relative permittivity, the effective conductivity,
and the thickness of the test sample. The actual measurement
setup consists of two Ka band standard gain horn antennas,
two Maury Microwave coaxial to waveguide adapters, and
Fig. 4. Parametric analysis of reflected and transmitted powers with respect the Keysight VNA (E8361C). The measurement is carried
to effective conductivity of media under test (dt = 15 mm and εrt = 10). out over a wide frequency range of 26.5–40 GHz. As stated
earlier, the number of frequency data points is very crucial
in Section IV) while updating the measurement vari- for the accurate determination of transmitted/reflected peaks.
ables, i.e., εrt , σt , and dt . Therefore, the number of frequency data points and the IF BW
The variations in primary/secondary reflected and transmit- are taken as N f = 6401 and IFBW = 30 Hz for the entire
ted powers, i.e., Pr1 , Pt 1 /Pr2 , Pt 2 , with respect to the effective measurement process. The transverse dimension of the test
conductivity σt of the MUT are presented in Fig. 4. In Fig. 4, sample is taken to be larger than the antenna aperture in order
the associated scales of primary and secondary reflected and to minimize the effect of the diffraction effects from the edges
transmitted power can be found at the left and the right y-axis, of the sample [11], [13]. In order to minimize the effect of
respectively. The following observations can be made from the edge diffraction, the distribution of the Poynting vector has
outcome of this analysis. been analyzed in past over the MUT’s interface and criterion
1) The proposed technique is well suited for the characteri- for transverse dimensions of sample has been made such that
zation of lossy dielectrics with the effective conductivity the normalized Poynting vector drops to −15 dB near the
ranging from 0.001 to 1. edges [15]. It is to be noted that if the lens-type focusing
2) The dynamic range of the proposed technique can antennas are used for the free-space measurement and the test
also be made suitable for low loss dielectric materials specimen is placed at the focus of both the antennas, then
provided that the sample thickness for these low loss the cross-sectional dimensions of the test sample can be lower
samples is reasonably increased in order to observe a than the antenna foot print.
substantial change in the measured powers (reflected and
transmitted) with respect to the dielectric loss. B. Measurement Results
It is to be noted that the power variation graphs, i.e., In this section, the effective dielectric properties of some
Figs. 3 and 4, providing the parametric variation behavior standards dielectric samples of different thicknesses are
2400 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 65, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2016

Fig. 5. Assessment of the proposed scheme for different sample thicknesses. (a) Comparison of actual and reconstructed values of relative permittivity and
thickness. (b) Comparison of actual and reconstructed effective conductivity (test sample: Arlon 600, εrt = 6, and σt = 0.01168).

The measurement is started by first considering a dielectric


slab of Plexiglas (commonly referred as PMMA) with a
dimension of 30 × 30 × 2.5 cm3 , which is placed in between
the transmitting and receiving antenna. Later, the a dielectric
slab PVC and polyethylene of dimension 30 × 30 × 2.3 cm3
are placed between the two sets of antenna as described
earlier. In a similar manner, various other dielectric samples,
i.e., nylon, polypropylene, and polyacetal of dimensions
50 × 50 × 3 cm3 are being measured. A mortar sample with
the dimension of 35 × 35 × 5 cm3 is also measured, and the
values of the relative permittivity, thickness, and the effec-
tive conductivity are extracted using the proposed technique.
It should be noted that the measurement of all the samples
Fig. 6. Actual measurement setup. is carried out seven times, and accordingly the mean value
and the standard deviation of the dielectric properties of each
obtained in order to validate the proposed approach. The sample are listed in Table II.
samples are placed in between the two horn antennas, as shown
in Fig. 6, such that the plane wave approximation can be made. C. Numerical Optimization Approach
It is to be noted here that the surface of the MUT should be The main aim of the analytical-based time domain approach
preferably flat, which allows the EM wave to incident normally proposed in Section III has been to determine the complex
over the MUT surface. In the present case, the test samples dielectric properties of the test specimen along with its thick-
are placed between the two antennas, which are separated by ness in terms of the equivalent time domain power quantities.
a distance of 70 cm. The proposed approach does not directly require the complex
The antennas are operating here in the frequency range scattering coefficients of the test specimen, and is practically
of 26.5–40 GHz. The various power peaks are obtained using adapted to free-space measurement without requiring any
the IFFT routines of the VNA. The values of the relative specific reference standards for calibration. The method works
permittivity, the effective conductivity, and the thicknesses quite well for most of the standard dielectric samples as seen
of various samples are subsequently calculated with help from validation using both the simulated and the experimental
of procedure explained earlier using (11)–(14). It is to be data. However, as mentioned in the previous part of this paper,
noted here that the dielectric properties of few reference various time domain power quantities in this paper are actually
samples considered here are not available in the literature obtained from the IFFT of the measured spectral domain
for the frequency band of 26.5–40 GHz. In order to validate scattering coefficient data due to nonavailability of the required
the measured data, the standards values are then taken from the setup for direct time domain measurement. Hence, in situations
adjacent reported frequency bands, assuming that the dielectric where the complex scattering coefficients of the test sample are
properties of these samples do not vary significantly with available, it looks useful to compare the scattering coefficients
frequency. in the frequency domain in addition to comparing the time
AKHTER AND AKHTAR: FREE-SPACE TIME DOMAIN POSITION INSENSITIVE TECHNIQUE 2401

TABLE II
M EASURED A SSESSMENT OF VARIOUS MUT’s PARAMETERS

domain power quantities to validate the reconstruction results.


The goal of the optimization approach proposed in this section
is to minimize the squared error between the measured and
the simulated scattering coefficients in the frequency domain
in order to obtain the dielectric properties and thickness of the
test sample. Now, it is a well-known fact that for stable and
fast convergence of any optimization approach and in order
to avoid the local minima problem, very good starting values
of the unknown parameters are required. In the present case,
various parameters for the optimization approach are obtained
using the proposed analytical approach expressed by a set of
equations (12)–(14). It is worth mentioning here that most of
the optimization approaches available in the literature provide
only electrical properties of the test specimen [35], whereas the
numerical optimization approach proposed in this section can
reconstruct the thickness along with the electrical properties
of the test specimen. In summary, it can be stated that the
optimization approach proposed here in conjunction with the
time domain approach described earlier can estimate dielec-
tric properties of the test specimen along with its thickness
provided that both the power scattering data and the reflection
and transmission coefficients of test specimen are measured.
The flowchart for the proposed optimization scheme is shown
in Fig. 7.
Initially, the proposed analytical algorithm is used in con-
junction with the directly measured scattering parameters in
order to obtain initial values of the relative permittivity, the Fig. 7. Flowchart for the optimization of material parameter. Abbreviation—
effective conductivity, and the thickness. The initial values BC: boundary conditions, N f : number of frequency samples, and
obtained with the help of the proposed closed form equations TOLFx: tolerance function. Superscripts—m: measured, s: simulated,
i: initial, and u: update. Subscripts—defined in the text.
are symbolically represented here as εrt i , σ i , and d i , respec-
t t
tively. These initial values, i.e., εrt , σt , and dti , are then used as
i i

input to the corresponding direct problem of the optimization that while utilizing the optimization procedure under practical
scheme. The formulation of direct problem is done here using scenario, the time gating function of the VNA has been used
the standard T-matrix approach. The direct problem here is an during the measurement procedure to collect the scattering
independent MATLAB program that calculates the scattering data termed as [S11 , S21 ]m in Fig. 7. The bandpass time gating
parameters of the three layer problem, i.e., air–dielectric–air. is then performed, which considers the primary and secondary
It is to be noted here that the accuracy of the proposed reflection/transmission peaks, i.e., Pr1 , Pt 1 /Pr2 , Pt 2 . Finally,
optimization scheme strongly depends on the accurateness with the deployment of time gating, the existing measurement
of direct problem formulation. It should be mentioned here state is converted into three layered media, i.e., air–MUT–air,
2402 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 65, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2016

Fig. 8. Junction and transmission line representation of time gated domain of discontinuous media.

as shown in Fig. 8. Now, in order to implement the correspond- or Pt 1 and Pt 2 , and τ1 = τ1 − τg_start and τ3 = τg_stop,
ing direct problem, the electrical and geometrical properties of where τg_start and τg_stop are the starting and stop time
each layer should be known in advance. corresponding the bandpass gate function, respectively.
The initial values of these properties are obtained using 5) The S-parameter of the corresponding direct problem
the earlier proposed analytical time domain procedure. The termed here as [S11 , S21 ]s is then calculated with the
procedure regarding the increment/decrement of the electrical help of T -matrix approach [35]. The number of fre-
and geometrical properties is given in Fig. 9. The important quency sample should be kept equal to the measured
points regarding the proposed algorithm can be itemized as data samples so that they can be compared.
follows. 6) The calculated S-parameters are then compared with the
1) In order to apply the direct problem formulation over measured time gated S-parameters and accordingly the
the reduced spatial domain, the parameters, such as d1 , objective function, i.e., the goal of the optimization,
d2 , εr0 , σ0 , should first be determined using the earlier expressed as the mean square error between the mea-
proposed analytical time domain procedure. sured (superscript m) and the simulated (superscript s)
2) The decision regarding the increment/decrement of the S-parameters, is defined using the following expression:
electrical and geometrical properties is taken using a ⎧ ⎫
methodology given in Fig. 8. ⎪
⎪ re S m (i ) − S s (i ) 2 ⎪

Nf ⎪⎪ 11
m 11 ⎪
2 ⎪
3) The background medium in the present situation is  ⎨
+ img S11 (i ) − S11 (i )
s ⎬
considered to be air. ∃=
⎪ + re S m (i ) − S s (i ) 2 ⎪ ⎪
i=1 ⎪⎪
4) The thicknesses of background front and back ⎪
⎩ 21m 21 2 ⎪



+ img S21 (i ) − S21 (i )
s
layer d1 and d2 shown in Fig. 8 are calculated with the
help of the following expressions:
where N f represents the number of frequency samples.
c × τ1 7) If the mean square error is in acceptable limit, the
d1 = (16) optimization routine will automatically stop. Otherwise,
 2 
τ it will update the variable optimization variable, i.e., εrt
u,
d2 = τ3 − × c − d1 (17) σt , and dt . The smart variable update, a subroutine-
u u
2
based process, which is responsible for updating
where c is the velocity of light in free space, τvalues the optimization variables after each step, is shown
represent the time separation between Pr1 and Pr2 , in Fig. 8.
AKHTER AND AKHTAR: FREE-SPACE TIME DOMAIN POSITION INSENSITIVE TECHNIQUE 2403

TABLE III
M EASURED A SSESSMENT OF VARIOUS O PTIMIZED MUT’s PARAMETERS

to fully independent sets of conditions. The following sets of


observation obtained from the sensitivity analysis play a quite
important role in decision making process for updating the
optimization variables.
m
1) The calculated measured power components, i.e., Pr1
m
and Pr2 , are considered to be fixed during the whole
optimization procedure.
s
2) There would be no change in the magnitude of Pr1 ,
when effective conductivity σt is incremented or decre-
s
mented. On the other hand, the magnitude of Pr2 would
be incremented if σt decreases and vice versa.
3) The error terms e1 = Pr1 m − P s , e = P m − P s , and
r1 2 r2 r2
e5 = τ −τ are considered here for optimization, where
m s

the objective here is to minimize the e5 first.


The priority of minimizing error terms in the present situ-
ation is chosen using the following strategy.
1) First, the time difference between the primary and sec-
ondary reflections τ is examined, i.e., error term e5 is
selected first.
2) Based on the sign of the error term e5 , an appropriate
path is chosen. For instance, if e5 is positive, the sign
of the error term e1 is checked first, and εrt is either
incremented (when e1 is positive) or decremented (when
e1 is negative). It is to be noted here that the increment
or decrement in εrt will improve both the error terms,
Fig. 9. Process diagram for the smart variable update with binary deci- i.e., e1 and e5 .
sion tree for updating the system parameter to obtain the optimum set of 3) Once, e1 is minimized to a desired level of accuracy,
parameters. then the role of dt comes into existence. As shown
in Fig. 8, dt is either incremented (when e5 is positive) or
The smart variable update subroutine utilizes different error decremented (when e5 is negative) until e5 is minimized
terms, i.e., e1 to e5 , as shown in Fig. 9. The values of to the desired level, and accordingly, the final value
different optimization variables (i.e., εrt
u , σ u , and d u ) are
t t
of dt is obtained. It is to be noted here that the value
then either incremented or decremented at each stage with of error term e1 does not vary during this update
respect to their previous values depending upon the sign mechanism.
of these error terms. The decision tree encircled shown in 4) Finally, the error term e2 is minimized by either incre-
Fig. 9 utilizes here mainly the terms e1 , e2 , and e5 to decide menting the effective conductivity σt (when e2 is neg-
the convergence criterion and to arrive at the final solution. ative) or by decrementing it (when e2 is positive). The
However, one can use other combinations of error terms, such final value of the effective conductivity σt is accordingly
as e3 , e4 , and e5 , as well to decide about the convergence obtained after the process is complete.
criterion. Table III shows the optimized value of the relative permittivity,
The reason for taking only three error terms to decide the the effective conductivity, and the thickness of some standard
convergence criterion is mainly due to the fact that they lead dielectric samples.
2404 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 65, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2016

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ACKNOWLEDGMENT half space time-domain measurement technique for one-dimensional
Z. Akhter would like to thank the reviewers for their com- microwave imaging,” in Proc. 83rd ARFTG Microw. Meas. Conf.,
Jun. 2014, pp. 1–4.
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Propag. (APSURSI), Jul. 2014, pp. 924–925.
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[33] A. K. Jha and M. J. Akhtar, “A generalized rectangular cavity approach Mohammad Jaleel Akhtar (S’99–M’03–
for determination of complex permittivity of materials,” IEEE Trans. SM’09) received the Ph.D. and Dr. Ing.
Instrum. Meas., vol. 63, no. 11, pp. 2632–2641, Nov. 2014. degrees in electrical engineering from
[34] C. Yeh and F. I. Shimabukuro, “Circular dielectric waveguides,” in the Otto-von-Guericke University of
The Essence of Dielectric Waveguides. Boston, MA, USA: Springer, Magdeburg, Magdeburg, Germany, in 2003.
2008. He was a Scientist with the Central Electronics
[35] M. J. Akhtar, L. E. Feher, and M. Thumm, “Noninvasive procedure Engineering Research Institute, Pilani, India, from
for measuring the complex permittivity of resins, catalysts, and 1994 to 1997, where he was involved in the
other liquids using a partially filled rectangular waveguide structure,” design and development of high power microwave
IEEE Trans. Microw. Theory Techn., vol. 57, no. 2, pp. 458–470, tubes. From 2003 to 2009, he was a Post-Doctoral
Feb. 2009. Research Scientist and a Project Leader with the
Institute for Pulsed Power and Microwave Technology, Karlsruhe Institute
of Technology, Karlsruhe, Germany, where he was involved in a number of
projects in the field of microwave material processing. In 2009, he joined
the Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT Kanpur, Kanpur, India, where
he is currently an Associate Professor. He has authored two books, two
Zubair Akhter (S’13) received the bachelor’s
book chapters, and has authored or co-authored over 100 papers in various
degree in electronics and instrumentation engi-
peer-reviewed international journals and conference proceedings. He holds
neering from Anand Engineering College Agra,
one patent on coplanar based RF sensors. His current research interests
Agra, India, in 2008, and the M.Tech. degree in
include RF, microwave and THz imaging, microwave nondestructive testing,
RF and microwave engineering from IIT Roorkee,
RF sensors, functional materials, wideband electromagnetic absorbers, UWB
Roorkee, India, in 2011. He is currently pur-
antennas for imaging, and design of RF filters and components using the
suing the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering
electromagnetic inverse scattering.
with IIT Kanpur (IITK), Kanpur, India, with a
Dr. Akhtar is a fellow of the Institution of Electronics and
focus on microwave imaging, material characteri-
Telecommunication Engineers, New Delhi, India, and a Life Member
zation, non-destructive testing of materials, through
of the Indian Physics Association and the Indo-French Technical Association.
wall imaging and ultra-wide antennas for imaging
He is a recipient of the CST University Publication Award in 2009 from the
applications.
CST AG, Darmstadt, Germany. He served as a Chair of the IEEE Microwave
He is currently involved in cost effective solutions for microwave imaging
Theory and Techniques Society-S Uttar Pradesh Chapter from 2013 to 2015,
of concealed object, especially for homeland security applications. He has
and the Vice-Chair of the IEEE Uttar Pradesh Section in 2015.
authored or co-authored over 20 scientific contributions published in peer-
reviewed journals and various admired international conferences. His current
research interests include developing a cost-effective microwave millimeter
wave imaging setup for real-time imaging of concealed object where objects
can be classified on the basis of their dielectric signatures rather that its
physical parameters, such as shape, and size.
Mr. Akhter is the Founder and a Chair of the IEEE Antennas and Propaga-
tion Society Student Branch Chapter IITK, Uttar Pradesh Section, India.

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