A 5-bit, 1.6ps resolution true time delay optical beamforming network for 4-element antenna arrays

Bogaert, Lies; Paula, Igor Lima de; Caytan, Olivier; Kerrebrouck, Joris Van; Muneeb, Muhammad; Brande, Quinten Van den; Rogier, Hendrik; Torfs, Guy; Bauwelinck, Johan; Roelkens, Günther

doi:10.1109/mwp53341.2021.9639408

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Furthermore, signals can easily be routed to the hybrid coupler under any incoming angle because of the bent feed lines. This allows the efficient and compact integration of the beamforming network with active electronic and even opto-electronic components [35], [36] into an antenna unit.…”

Section: A Quadrature Hybrid Coupler Designsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A 4 × 4 Millimeterwave-Frequency Butler Matrix in Grounded Co-Planar Waveguide Technology for Compact Integration With 5G Antenna Arrays

Messem

Moerman

Caytan

et al. 2023

IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Techn.

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This article presents a novel 4 × 4 Butler matrix implemented in the grounded co-planar waveguide (GCPW) technology, compactly integrated with a highly efficient and broadband 1 × 4 air-filled substrate integrated waveguide (AFSIW) cavity-backed patch antenna array (AA), giving rise to a broad operational frequency range [23.75, 31 GHz] (26.5%) covering the n257, n258, and n261 fifth-generation (5G) bands. Three novel quadrature hybrid couplers and two crossovers are designed and compared to obtain the optimal building blocks for the Butler matrix. Within each of the supported 5G bands, the measured excess insertion loss of the optimized Butler matrix remains smaller than 3.5 dB with a maximal amplitude imbalance of ±0.9 dB. Isolation between input ports is higher than 16.4 dB. A maximal measured realized gain of 12.3 dBi is obtained for the Butler matrix with integrated 1 × 4 AA while ensuring a −3-dB beamwidth coverage of 110 • . The main beamsteering directions of [−40 • , −14 • , 14 • , 40 • ] exhibit measured deviations that stay within ±3 • . The fabricated Butler matrix with AA features a very compact footprint of 21.4 mm × 46.0 mm × 2 mm [2λ 0 × 4.3λ 0 × 0.2λ 0 ].

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Section: A Quadrature Hybrid Coupler Designsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A 4 × 4 Millimeterwave-Frequency Butler Matrix in Grounded Co-Planar Waveguide Technology for Compact Integration With 5G Antenna Arrays

Messem

Moerman

Caytan

et al. 2023

IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Techn.

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“…The loss of these waveguides can be as low as 3 dB/m 31 , compared to a loss of approximately 1 dB/ cm for state-of-the-art electrical waveguides at these frequencies 32 . Because of this low loss, the PIC can easily be reused to implement an optical beamforming network (OBFN) 33,34 through a network of switchable delay lines which act as true-time delay (TTD) cells. As these apply a different phase to each frequency of the signal, the issue of beam squint is negated.…”

Section: Opto-electronic Transmitter System Architecturementioning

confidence: 99%

A compact SiGe D-band power amplifier for scalable photonic-enabled phased antenna arrays

Broucke,

Singh,

Van Osta

et al. 2023

Sci Rep

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To address the rising demand for high-speed wireless data links, communication systems operating at frequencies beyond $${100}\,\hbox {GHz}$$ 100 GHz are being targeted. A key enabling technology in the development of these wireless systems is the phased antenna array. Yet, the design and implementation of such steerable antenna arrays at frequencies over $${100}\,\hbox {GHz}$$ 100 GHz comes with a multitude of challenges. In particular, the cointegration of active electronics at each antenna element poses a major hurdle due to the inherent space constraints in the array. This article proposes a novel scalable concept for opto-electronic phased antenna arrays operating at 140 GHz. It details the system architecture of a transmitter that enables the implementation of large scale, wideband, 2D steerable phased antenna arrays and presents the design and measurement of a compact SiGe power amplifier (PA) chip to be used as one of its key building blocks. The amplifier achieves a gain of 20 dB at 135 GHz, features a $$P_{1dB}$$ P 1 d B of 14.6 dBm and can support data rates up to 45 Gbps in a limited footprint of only 540μm × 550μm. This makes it one of the fastest, most powerful D-band power amplifiers in literature with a footprint compatible with $$\frac{\lambda }{2}$$ λ 2 -spaced phased array integration.

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“…This paper is an invited extension of our work presented at the International Topical Meeting on Microwave Photonics [15], including a more detailed description of the antenna array and the opto-electrical transmit chain, focusing in particular on their compact integration, the adopted co-design strategy and the assembly of the entire unit. The proposed RAU is also validated more extensively by demonstrating optical beam steering towards angles up to 50°, and by describing several multi-Gbps fiber-wireless communication experiments.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Air-Filled SIW Remote Antenna Unit With True Time Delay Optical Beamforming for mmWave-Over-Fiber Systems

Paula

Bogaert

Caytan

et al. 2022

J. Lightwave Technol.

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A low-complexity and efficient mmWave-over-fiber remote antenna unit (RAU) is proposed that enables broadband transmission and wide-angle squint-free beam steering in the full [26.5-29.5] GHz n257 5G band. It leverages an in-house developed optical beamforming network (OBFN), implemented on a silicon photonics integrated circuit, and a broadband optically enabled 1x4 uniform linear array (ULA), enabling grating-lobe-free beam steering between [-50 • , 50 • ]. The antenna elements (AEs) of the ULA are implemented in air-filled substrate-integratedwaveguide technology. They adopt a novel improved aperturecoupled feeding scheme to achieve high efficiency, high isolation and minimal back radiation over a broad frequency band. Each AE is compactly integrated and co-optimized with a dedicated opto-electrical transmit chain, maximizing the RAU's performance, including beamforming flexibility and energy efficiency, while minimizing its size. The separately packaged OBFN implements true-time-delay beamforming by means of four switchable optical delay lines that are capable of discretely tuning the delay difference between AEs with a resolution of 1.6 ps, up to a maximum delay of 49.6 ps to fully exploit the ULA's full grating-lobe-free scan range. Measurements show that the AEs are excellently matched in the [25.1-30.75] GHz band, exhibit high isolation (>15 dB) in the operating band, and feature a stable peak gain of 6.8±0.72 dBi with a beamwidth of at least 95 • . Additionally, optical beamforming was successfully demonstrated by steering the RAU's beam towards angles up to 51.8 • , with a maximum gain degradation below 0.6 dB. Finally, the optically enabled 1×4 ULA successfully establishes a 64-QAM wireless communication link at 2.2 Gbaud (13.2 Gbps) while beam steering up to 50 • with an error vector magnitude below 7.6%.

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A 5-bit, 1.6ps resolution true time delay optical beamforming network for 4-element antenna arrays

Cited by 3 publications

References 14 publications

A 4 × 4 Millimeterwave-Frequency Butler Matrix in Grounded Co-Planar Waveguide Technology for Compact Integration With 5G Antenna Arrays

A 4 × 4 Millimeterwave-Frequency Butler Matrix in Grounded Co-Planar Waveguide Technology for Compact Integration With 5G Antenna Arrays

A compact SiGe D-band power amplifier for scalable photonic-enabled phased antenna arrays

Air-Filled SIW Remote Antenna Unit With True Time Delay Optical Beamforming for mmWave-Over-Fiber Systems

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