1.

30

MICROSTRIP ANTENNAS ON FERRITES

J C Batchelor, G Classen and R . J .

Langley

University of Kent, UK

INTRODUCTION FREQUENCY TUNING AND MODELLING

There is much interest in the use of ferrite substrates for microstrip patch antennas. Recent work has concentrated on rectangular patches Pozar (1,2) and annular rings operating at both the fundamental and higher order modes Tsang and Langley ( 3 ) . The high dielectric constant of the ferrite brings about a reduction in the antenna dimensions. When biased with a magnetic field the antennas exhibit a number of novel properties ( 1 - 3 ) . These include frequency tuning over a 1 5 - 4 0 % range, the generation of two opposite hands of circular polarisation and beam steering possibilities. This paper will discuss two aspects of circular microstrip antennas on ferrite substrates. The first is spectral domain modelling of the frequency tuning characteristics for a circular patch on ferrite. Details of the model together with a comparison with experimental results are given. Phased arrays often use ferrite phase shifters to change the phase of individual elements and produce electronic beamsteering. In the second section we demonstrate a simple but effective means of controlling the beam angle from 2 and 4 element arrays where the patch elements are fed by a microstrip line on a ferrite substrate. Biasing the ferrite causes a shift in the phase length of the line hence varying the beam angle. YIG ferrites were used in the experiments, the materials a r e available from Transtech. These included G 1 1 3 material with a saturation magnetisation of 4xM, = 1 7 3 0 Gauss and ~ , = 1 4 . 7 8 , and G350 ferrite with 4xMs = 3 4 8 Gauss and E,=13.8. Loss tangents were 0.0002

The circular patch element geometry is shown in Fig.1. The rings discussed here were all fed by coaxial probes and printed on a ferrite substrate, E~ = 13.78, 1 mm thick with 4EM, = 650G.

It is well known that, when biased with a dc magnetic field, ferrites exhibit an anisotropic permeability which can be described by a tensor

-jK 0

PLr= j K F

. I . =

patch

. 1

magnet

Fig.1. Circular patch on biased ferrite substrate

10th International Conference on Antennas and Propagation, 14-17 April 1997, Conference Publication No. 436 0 IEE 1997

1.31 The spectral domain model outlined in Naito et al. ( 4 ) , Lee and Fan ( 5 ) was used to analyse the antenna. Electromagnetically coupled patches on ferrite-dielectric substrates were also modelled. The analysis is carried out in the Hankel domain and consists of the following steps: obtain the differential equations for the electric and magnetic fields using Maxwells equations; apply boundary conditions to obtain the Greens functions; solve the resulting integral equation using the method of moments;

4000.0

/ i

fr
3000.0 2500.0

k:
n=- 1
x x x

2000.0

Fig.2 Resonant frequency of patch tuned using dc magnetic bias

MICROSTRIP LINE ON FERRITE SUBSTRATE

n = +/-1 refers to the two hands of circular polarisation generated by the magnetic bias normal to the ferrite. Appropriate expressions for the permeability as the bias is varied can be found in Batchelor (7). Fig.2 compares the calculated results with experimental results for a circular disk of radius b=lO.lmm and 4nM, = 650G. The resonant frequencies of the t w o hands of circular polarisation diverge on applying the dc magnetic bias, n=+l increasing with bias while n=-1 decreases initially until saturation is reached when it then increases. There is good agreement between theory and measurement and a wide tuning range is achieved.

The effective permeability of a ferrite can be varied by applying a d.c. magnetic bias field. The rate of change depends on the bias point and direction of magnetic bias. A microstrip line printed on a ferrite changes its phase significantly when a normal directed bias is applied. This concept can be used to steer the beam of a travelling wave fed array. To demonstrate it a microstrip line 3cm long was printed on G350 ferrite substrate. A magnetic bias was applied using a permanent magnet underneath the substrate and normal to the line. The bias field affected about 1.5 cm of the line. Fig.3 shows the transmission magnitude and phase of the line as a function of magnetic bias field. The magnitude. of the loss remains virtually constant until a bias of about 2,200 Oe after which the line becomes lossy very rapidly. This is near the absorption resonance of the ferrite. At this point the phase shift along the line is also changing rapidly. A 1 dB l o s s occurs at 2,250 Oe bias. From 2,000 to 2,250 Oe the phase change in the line was measured at 6 0 . This is a significant shift for a small change in bias with little attenuation. The phase shift along the line is of

10th International Conference on Antennas and Propagation, 14-17 April 1997, Conference Publication No. 436 0 IEE 1997

1.32

course related to the change in permeability of the ferrite as the bias changes. A comparison between the

0.0

To demonstrate the potential application as a simple phased array feed a two element array was made on a composite ferrite-dielectric substrate as shown in Fig.4. The microstrip feed line was printed on the ferrite material while the array elements were printed on a high permittivity

dielectric with E r

10.2. The resonant

-300

13

I'

15

20

25

J -1000 30

frequency of the circular patches on the dielectric remained unchanged as the bias field was applied normal to the ferrite area. The resulting beam steering of this array is shown in Fig.5 for 3 magnetic bias fields. There is little change in the beam direction before 1820 Oe bias, the beam direction squinting at 5. ' Increasing the bias by 100 Oe moves the beam angle to 20" while a further small increase
of just 20 Oe moves it to over 3 0 " . A

Magnetic Bias (KOe)

Fig.3 Transmission characteristics for microstrip line on biased ferrite substrate effective permeability calculated from the spectral domain analysis as a function of normal bias field and the measured phase shift shows good agreement as expected.

sidelobe appears as the scan angle increases as expected. Calculated patterns simulated using the Hewlett Packard MDS software for the array are also plotted in Fig.5. These show good agreement although the predicted sidelobe levels are lower. At 4 ' scan 0 angle a l o s s of approximately 2 dB as measured due to ferrite losses.

TWO ELEMENT ARRAY

-90
- 1 OdBldivision

90

___ 1 . 8 2 K O e , measured x prediction 1 . 9 2 K O e . measured 0 prediction _ _ _ _ 1 . 9 4 K O e , measured prediction

Fig.4 Two element array with phase shifting feed on biased ferrite

Fig.5 Beam steering for two element array with biased microstrip feed

10th International Conference on Antennas and Propagation, 14-17 April 1997, Conference Publication No. 436 0 IEE 1997

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FOUR-ELEMENT ARRAY
Increasing the number of elements to four obviously narrows the beam width of the pattern in one plane. The additional benefit is that less magnetic bias is needed to produce an equivalent shift in beam direction. For example 150' of line phase shift is needed to move the 2 element array beam by 30' whereas only 100' is needed for the 4 element linear array. A 4 element version of the array in Fig.4 is currently under construction. However, the simulated array patterns are plotted in Fig.6. Beam steering of up to 35' is easily achieved with slightly less magnetic bias field required. Better sidelobe levels are predicted. in line with standard array antennas.

above and below saturation magnetisation. The principle of beam steering a simple two element array using a biased microstrip line printed on a ferrite has been demonstrated. The biased microstrip line feed produces a phase shift of 4 0 per cm with low l o s s . Significant changes in phase were noted or small bias field changes. Beam scan angles of up to 40' were measured. This technique has potential for phased arrays, particularly if prebiased, hexaferrites substrates were used, as only small bias field changes would be needed to bring about useful shifts in beam direction.

Acknowledgements. This work was supported by the EPSRC.

References 1. Pozar, D.M., 1992,"Radiation and scattering characteristics of microstrip antennas on normally biased ferrite substrates", IEEE Trans, AP-40, 1084-1092 2. Pozar, D.M. and Sanchez, V . , 1989,"Magnetic tuning of a microstrip antenna on a ferrite substrate", Electron Letts, 2 4 729-731 _, 3. Tsang, K . K . and Langley, R.J., 1994,"Annular ring microstrip antennas on biased ferrite substrates", Electron Letts, 30, 1257-1258. 4. Naito, Y., Araki, K. and Kim, D.I., 1982, "A study on circular disk resonators on a ferrite substrate", IEEE Trans., MTT-30, 147-154 5. Lee, K . and Fan, Z., 1991, "Hankel transform domain analysis of dual-frequency stacked circular-disk and annular-ring microstrip antennas", IEEE Trans., AP-39, 867-870 6. Pucel, A.R. and Masse, J.D., 1974,"Microstrip propagation on magnetic substrates - part 1: Design theo r y " , IEEE Trans., MTT-22, 304-308 7. Batchelor, J.C., Tsang, K . K . and Langley, R.J., 1996, "Annular ring patch antennas with biased ferrites", Alta Freauenza Revista di Elettronica, 8(1), 37-39

-90
-1 OdWdivision

!aos

-0
.

degrees

----

90 degrees 120 degrees

Fig.6 Calculated beam steering of 4 element array for 3 feed line phase shifts Total phase shift:

0 '

. ....... goo
- - - - - - - - 120 '

CONCLUSION

circular patch microstrip antenna has been tested on biased ferrite substrates. The spectral domain moments method solution p r o d u c e s accurate results of the frequency tuning characteristics for magnetic bias fields

10th International Conference on Antennas and Propagation, 14-17 April 1997, Conference Publication No. 436 0 IEE 1997