A new analytical method for complete six-port reflectometer calibration

A novel procedure is described for the calibration of an arbitrary six-port reflectometer. The analytical method reduces the six-port to a four-port, but in contrast to Engen (see IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech., vol.MTT-26, p.951-957, Dec. 1978) for the symmetric determination of the six- to four-port reduction parameters, only five reflective terminations are necessary with their reflection coefficient lying on the same circle of unknown amplitude and phase position (e.g. a sliding short). In contrast to most other procedures, all equations resulting from suitable substitutions are linearly independent, and therefore no restrictions on the six-port design are necessary. The calibration steps were verified by a six-port simulation. Experimental results measured with a W-band (90-100 GHz) six-port using diode detectors demonstrate the capability of this procedure