Silicon-on-Glass Dielectric Waveguide—Part I: For Millimeter-Wave Integrated Circuits

A low-cost Silicon-on-Glass (SOG) integrated circuit technology is proposed for millimeter-wave (mmW) applications, for the first time. In the proposed technology, all mmW passive components are made of high-resistivity Silicon (Si) on a glass substrate. The proposed technique leads to a high-precision and low-cost fabrication process, which eliminates the need for costly assembly of the complex structures. This is achieved by photolithography and dry etching of the entire integrated passive circuit through the Si layer of the SOG wafer. Silicon-on-Glass dielectric waveguide, as the basic component of the SOG integrated circuit, is theoretically and experimentally investigated. A test setup is designed to measure propagation characteristics of the proposed SOG waveguide. Measured dispersion diagrams of the SOG dielectric waveguide show average attenuation constants of 0.63 dB/cm, 0.28 dB/cm, and 0.53 dB/cm over 55-65 GHz, 90-110 GHz, and 140-170 GHz, respectively.