Leaky-wave antenna on planar Goubau line at THz frequencies

A periodic leaky-wave antenna working in the THz band is proposed. The leakage is produced by periodically perturbing a planar Goubau line. The fundamental mode of this transmission line is quite similar to the fundamental mode of the Sommerfeld line, which has been recently considered for long-path transmission in the THz band due to its low attenuation and low dispersion in a wide bandwidth. This paper proposes the use of the periodic leaky-wave antenna to efficiently couple the energy of an incident wave to the planar Goubau line and, from this, to the Sommerfeld line. Results illustrate the way in which an incident beam on the proposed antenna excites the fundamental mode of the planar Goubau line.