Properties of Building and Plastic Materials in the THz Range

Abstract

We present measurements of the frequency dependent refractive index and absorption coefficient of a variety of common building and plastic materials between 100 and 1000 GHz. Accurate knowledge of the material parameters is indispensable for the modeling of bound media propagation phenomena including single and multiple reflections, transmission, diffraction and scattering effects. These models are for example required for a reliable channel simulation to investigate signal propagation in future wireless communication systems operating with Gigabit data rates at frequencies above 100 GHz. Also, the measured material parameters can be used for the investigation and development of THz system components.

Terahertz-time domain spectrometer with 90 dB peak dynamic range

“…The refractive index of PA is 1.71 at 0.5 THz and decreases very slightly towards higher frequencies. Our results for PA and HDPE are in very good agreement with literature data [41].…”

Material thickness optimization for transmission-mode terahertz time-domain spectroscopy

“…Figure 3 shows the extracted optical constants. Clearly, the refractive index is nearly constant (C) 2008 OSA at 1.63, lower than the previously published value at 1.67 [24]. The absorption coefficient increases quadratically, also in accordance with [24].…”

“…Clearly, the refractive index is nearly constant (C) 2008 OSA at 1.63, lower than the previously published value at 1.67 [24]. The absorption coefficient increases quadratically, also in accordance with [24]. Note that small shifts in the refractive indices of plastics at T-ray frequencies are known to be caused by slight hygroscopicity [11] and differences in the manufacturing process.…”

High-Efficiency Micromachined Sub-THz Channels for Low-Cost Interconnect for Planar Integrated Circuits

“…It is therefore desirable to use low-loss materials as the dielectric medium. Several materials have been studied at sub-THz frequencies, such as silicon [21], [26]- [30], quartz [21], and plastic [31], [32]. These research provides evidence that dielectric sub-THz interconnect channels can be designed with low loss.…”