RF-MEMS and its applications to microwave systems, antennas and wireless communications

Author

Christodoulou, Christos G.

Author_Institution

Electr. & Comput. Eng. Dept., New Mexico Univ., Albuquerque, NM, USA

Volume

1

fYear

2003

fDate

20-23 Sept. 2003

Firstpage

525

Abstract

MEMS-based products combine both mechanical and electronic devices on a monolithic microchip to produce superior performance over solid-state components, especially for wireless applications. RF-MEMS components are mainly used as inductors, tunable capacitors, switches, in VCOs, and resonators. Popular MEMS switches for wireless applications include transmit/receive duplexers, band-mode selection, time delay for phased-array antennas, and reconfigurable antennas. This paper talks about the use of MEMS switches in conjunction of fractal antennas to achieve multi-frequency, reconfigurable antennas that can be used for a variety of communication applications and how micromachining can be used to fabricated new 3-D MEMS antenna structures for very high frequency applications.

Keywords

UHF antennas; antenna phased arrays; antenna radiation patterns; dipole antenna arrays; helical antennas; micromechanical devices; microswitches; microwave antenna arrays; microwave links; microwave switches; multifrequency antennas; submillimetre wave antennas; RF MEMS; VCO; band-mode selection; dipole microstructures; duplexers; fractal antennas; helical antenna; inductors; micromachining; monolithic microchip; multiple frequency antennas; phased-array antennas; radiation pattern; reconfigurable antennas; switches; time delay; tunable capacitors; wireless communication applications; Capacitors; Inductors; Microswitches; Microwave antennas; Microwave devices; Radiofrequency microelectromechanical systems; Receiving antennas; Solid state circuits; Transmitting antennas; Wireless communication;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Microwave and Optoelectronics Conference, 2003. IMOC 2003. Proceedings of the 2003 SBMO/IEEE MTT-S International

Print_ISBN

0-7803-7824-5

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/IMOC.2003.1244915

Filename

1244915