All-dielectric fiber optic passive millimeter-wave antenna

Wen Cheng Wang; Weiping Lin; Hank Marshall; David T. Schaafsma; Richard Chaung

doi:10.1117/12.487164

23 July 2003 All-dielectric fiber-optic passive millimeter-wave antenna

Wen Cheng Wang, Weiping Lin, Hank Marshall, David T. Schaafsma, Richard Chaung

Proceedings Volume 5100, Digital Wireless Communications V; (2003) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.487164
Event: AeroSense 2003, 2003, Orlando, Florida, United States

Abstract

An integrated Mach-Zehnder interferometer made of electro-optic polymer, which has excellent broadband (>100 GHz) response, was fabricated as a mm-wave receive antenna. When an electric field is applied to the interferometer arm(s) made of EO material, a phase delay is generated which results in a net imbalance in the interferometer and thus a change in the output intensity. This output intensity change, which contains electric field strength and temporal profile information, is then read by a photodetector and processed. To test this antenna in free space, a micro-strip travelling electromagnetic cell, which has uniform electric field distribution in the 1 GHz range, was constructed. The test results show the antenna had good linear response over a 40 dB power range, at 1 GHz center frequency. The measured minimum detectable E-field strength was about 0.22 V/m (or 6.7 nW/cm²) at 1 kHz bandwidth with a laser power of 7.9 μWatt (-21dBm) measured after the sensor, which agrees with our theoretical calculations. The measured E-field signal increases with increasing laser power, which indicates that significant sensitivity improvement, can be easily obtained by lowering passive losses. The antenna was found to be thermally stable over a temperature range from -30 to 50 C. The antenna sensitivity can be further improved by lowering the device insertion loss, optimizing the photodetector and detection circuitry, and using EO polymers with higher electro-optic coefficients.

Citation Download Citation

Wen Cheng Wang, Weiping Lin, Hank Marshall, David T. Schaafsma, and Richard Chaung "All-dielectric fiber-optic passive millimeter-wave antenna", Proc. SPIE 5100, Digital Wireless Communications V, (23 July 2003); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.487164

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available