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Published in IET Microwaves, Antennas & Propagation
Received on 15th September 2010
Revised on 6th December 2010
doi: 10.1049/iet-map.2010.0463

Special Issue on RF/Microwave Communication

Subsystems for Emerging Wireless Technologies
ISSN 1751-8725

Review of substrate-integrated waveguide circuits

and antennas
M. Bozzi1 A. Georgiadis2 K. Wu3
1

Department of Electronics, University of Pavia, Pavia 27100, Italy

Centre Tecnologic de Telecomunicacions de Catalunya, CTTC, Castelldefels 08860, Spain
3
Department of Electrical Engineering, Poly-Grames Research Center, Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal, Montreal,
Quebec, Canada, H3T 1J4
E-mail: [email protected]
2

Abstract: Substrate-integrated waveguide (SIW) technology represents an emerging and very promising candidate for the
development of circuits and components operating in the microwave and millimetre-wave region. SIW structures are generally
fabricated by using two rows of conducting cylinders or slots embedded in a dielectric substrate that connects two parallel
metal plates, and permit the implementation of classical rectangular waveguide components in planar form, along with printed
circuitry, active devices and antennas. This study aims to provide an overview of the recent advances in the modelling, design
and technological implementation of SIW structures and components.

Introduction

Wireless components and systems have received increased

interest in recent years, as new applications for millimetrewaves (mm-waves) are being introduced and developed. In
fact, a variety of applications have been recently proposed
in the frequency range over 60 94 GHz, including wireless
networks [1], automotive radars [2], imaging sensors [3]
and biomedical devices [4].
The deployment of mm-wave technologies is critical for
the evolution of wireless systems as broadband and highresolution techniques are naturally supported by the use of
mm-waves. In most of these systems, the success mainly
depends on the availability of a cost-effective technology,
suitable for the mass-production of components and systems.
It is expected that high-density integration techniques,
combined with a low-cost fabrication process, should be
able to offer widespread solutions for mm-wave commercial
applications.
The core of these systems is related to the active part, which
includes components such as local oscillators, mixers and
possibly low-noise ampliers among others. Nowadays, such
components can be integrated in the form of chip-sets at
reasonably low cost. Several semiconductor companies are
currently working towards the development of chip-sets
operating at 60 GHz or even at higher frequencies [5].
Nevertheless, other components are needed in mm-wave
systems, which cannot be conveniently integrated in the
chip-set, because either they are too large or the required
performance cannot be achieved by integrated components
(such as antennas, selective lters and power ampliers).
These additional components could be simply considered
as the package that embeds the chip-set, but they actually
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represent a signicant portion of the system. With the

concept of the system in package (SiP) [6], one or more
chip-sets are combined in a single package with the other
components, which are fabricated with different
technologies. At low frequencies these components are
typically fabricated in planar technology (microstrip or
coplanar waveguides); at frequencies higher than 30 GHz,
however, transmission losses and radiation prevent the use of
microstrip or coplanar waveguides and other technological
solutions have to be identied. We can therefore conclude
that the successful development of mm-wave wireless
systems requires the denition of a platform for
implementing all these components with a high performance,
low-cost and reliable technology.
A promising candidate for developing this platform is
substrate-integrated waveguide (SIW) technology [7 11].
SIWs are integrated waveguide-like structures fabricated by
using two rows of conducting cylinders or slots embedded
in a dielectric substrate that electrically connect two parallel
metal plates (Fig. 1). In this way, the non-planar rectangular
waveguide can be made in planar form, compatible with
existing planar processing techniques (e.g. standard printed
circuit board (PCB) or low-temperature co-red ceramic
(LTCC) technology). SIW structures exhibit propagation
characteristics similar to the ones of classical rectangular
waveguides, including the eld pattern and the dispersion
characteristics. Moreover, SIW structures preserve most
of the advantages of conventional metallic waveguides,
namely high quality-factor and high power-handling
capability with self-consistent electrical shielding. The most
signicant advantage of SIW technology is the possibility
to integrate all the components on the same substrate,
including passive components, active elements and even
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Fig. 1 Geometry of a SIW

antennas. Moreover, there is the possibility to mount one or

more chip-sets on the same substrate. There is no need for
transitions between elements fabricated with different
technologies, thus reducing losses and parasitics. In this
way, the concept of SiP can be extended to the systemon-substrate (SoS) [12]. SoS represents the ideal platform
for developing cost-effective, easy-to-fabricate and highperformance mm-wave systems.
First developed with the name of post-wall waveguide [7]
or laminated waveguide [8] for feeding networks in antenna
arrays, the SIW technology has been applied to several
microwave components, including post and cavity lters
[9, 13], directional couplers [14], oscillators [15, 16], power
ampliers [17, 18], slot array and leaky antennas [19, 20],
six-port circuits [21] and circulators [22]. From the
technical literature, it is seen that most of the classical
waveguide components have been implemented in SIW
technology. Nevertheless, most of these SIW components
operate in the frequency range up to 30 GHz, with a few
exceptions at higher frequency [23 26]. This phenomenon
is not due to physical limitations of SIW components, but
to the increased technological difculties encountered in
designing and manufacturing SIW structures over the mmwave range, namely, miniaturised dimensions, higher losses
and the need to carefully select the material. Therefore
current and future research activity aims to overcome these
difculties, in order to use SIW technology as an
interconnection and integration platform for mm-wave
systems.

2
2.1

SIW structures
Operation principles

SIW structures exhibit propagation characteristics similar to

those of rectangular metallic waveguides, provided that the
metallic vias are closely spaced and radiation leakage can
be neglected (Fig. 2). More specically, SIW modes
practically coincide with a subset of the guided modes of
the rectangular waveguide, namely with the TEn0 modes,
with n 1, 2, . . . . TM modes are not supported by SIW,

Fig. 2 Plot of the amplitude of the electric modal vector of the

fundamental SIW mode
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due to the gaps between metal vias: in fact, transverse

magnetic elds determine longitudinal surface currents,
which are subject to strong radiation due to the presence of
the gaps [1]. In particular, the fundamental mode is similar
to the TE10 mode of a rectangular waveguide (Fig. 2), with
vertical electric current density on the side walls.
Owing to this similarity between SIW and rectangular
waveguide, empirical relations have been obtained between
the geometrical dimensions of the SIW and the effective
width weff of the rectangular waveguide with the same
propagation characteristics. These relations allow for a
preliminary dimensioning and design of SIW components,
without any need of full-wave analysis tools. One of the
most popular relations was derived in [27]
weff = w

d2
0.95s

(1)

where d is the diameter of the metal vias, w represents their

transverse spacing and s is their longitudinal spacing (Fig. 1).
Relation (1) was subsequently rened in [10]
weff = w 1.08

d2
d2
+ 0.1
s
w

(2)

Another relation was proposed in [28]

w=



2weff
ps
s
cot1
ln
p
4weff 2d

(3)

A more rigorous determination of the propagation

characteristics of SIW structures can be based on full-wave
analysis tools, either commercial software (e.g. Ansoft
high-frequency simulation study or computer simulated
technology Microwave Studio) or in-house developed
electromagnetic simulators: among them, the most common
techniques are based on the nite-difference time domain
method or the nite-difference frequency domain [29], the
boundary integral-resonant mode expansion (BI-RME)
method [27], the method of lines [30] and the transverse
resonance method [11]. In all cases, the determination of
the propagation and attenuation constants of SIW structures
is based on the analysis of the single unit cell (Fig. 1), thus
signicantly reducing the computational effort.
2.2

Loss mechanisms

A key issue in the design of SIW structures is related to loss

minimisation, which is particularly critical when operating at
mm-wave frequencies. Three major mechanisms of loss need
to be considered in the design of SIW structures [31, 32]: they
are conductor losses (due to the nite conductivity of metal
walls), dielectric losses (due to the lossy dielectric material)
and possibly radiation losses (due to the energy leakage
through the gaps). The behaviour of conductor and
dielectric losses is similar to the corresponding losses in
rectangular waveguides lled with a dielectric medium,
and the classical equations can be effectively applied. It
transpires that conductor losses can be signicantly reduced
by increasing the substrate thickness, being the
corresponding attenuation constant almost proportional to
the inverse of substrate thickness h. The other geometrical
dimensions of the SIW exhibit a negligible effect on
conductor losses. Conversely, dielectric losses depend only
on the dielectric material and not on the geometry of the
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SIW structure, and therefore they can be reduced only by
using a better dielectric substrate. Finally, radiation losses
can be kept reasonably small if s/d , 2.5, with s/d 2
being the recommended value. In fact, when the spacing s
is small and the diameter d of the metal vias is large, the
gap between the metal vias is small, thus approaching
the condition of continuous metal wall and minimising the
radiation leakage. Generally speaking, the contribution of
dielectric losses is predominant at mm-wave frequencies,
when using typical substrate thickness and commercial
dielectric material [32].
The insertion loss usually calculated for SIW structure,
which accounts for conductor, dielectric and radiation
losses, can be signicantly increased by the effect of
surface roughness in conductors. Analytical models of
losses due to the surface roughness have been developed
for classical waveguides, and are incorporated in
commercial electromagnetic simulators. Recently, this issue
has been carefully investigated through numerical and
experimental studies in the case of microstrip transmission
lines [33], whereas no publications have been reported yet
in the case of SIW structures.
It is also particularly relevant to compare losses in SIW
structures and in other traditional planar structures, for
example, microstrip or coplanar lines. A systematic
comparison of SIW and microstrip components is not easy,
because SIW circuits are usually implemented on a thick
substrate with low dielectric constant (which is not suitable
for the implementation of microstrip circuits), with the aim
of minimising conductor losses. In principle, microstrip
component losses could also be mitigated by increasing the
substrate thickness; in practice, however, this cannot be
exploited due to the unacceptable increase in radiation loss
and excitation of surface waves. A detailed comparison of
losses in SIW structures, microstrip lines and coplanar
waveguides is reported in [34]: it is seen that SIW structures
can guarantee comparable or lower losses, compared to
traditional planar transmission lines.
2.3

Size and bandwidth

Another important topic to be accounted for in the design

of SIW structures is the performance in terms of size
and operation bandwidth. In fact, similar to rectangular

waveguides, SIW structures are limited in compactness and

bandwidth. The width of the SIW determines the cutoff
frequency of the fundamental mode (with a reduction of
factor 121/2
over hollow rectangular waveguides). The
r
operation bandwidth is limited to one octave (from the
cutoff frequency f1 of the TE10 mode to cutoff frequency
f2 2f1 of the TE20 mode), corresponding to the monomode bandwidth of the waveguide.
Different waveguide topologies have recently been
proposed to improve the compactness of SIW structures
(Fig. 3). The substrate-integrated folded waveguide (SIFW)
was proposed in [35] (Fig. 3a): a metal septum permits
folding of the waveguide, thus reducing the size by a factor
of more than two at the cost of slightly larger losses. The
half-mode substrate-integrated waveguide (HMSIW) was
introduced in [36] (Fig. 3b): based on the approximation of
the vertical cut of the waveguide as a virtual magnetic wall,
it permits a size reduction of nearly 50%. A combination
of the two techniques was also proposed [37], resulting
in the folded half-mode substrate-integrated waveguide
(FHMSIW), which leads to a further size reduction.
To improve the bandwidth performance, some waveguide
congurations have been developed. The substrate-integrated
slab waveguide (SISW) was proposed in [38] (Fig. 3c): it
consists of an SIW where the dielectric medium is
periodically perforated with air-lled holes, located in the
lateral portion of the waveguide. This approach enabled
the design of a waveguide with a mono-modal band from
7.5 to 18 GHz (with 40% bandwidth enhancement). The
implementation of a ridge waveguide in SIW technology was
proposed in [39], where the ridge was implemented through a
row of thin, partial-height metal posts located in the centre of
the longer side of the waveguide. This structure allowed
coverage of the mono-modal band from 4.9 to 13.39 GHz,
thus achieving a 73% bandwidth enhancement. A signicant
improvement in the performance of the ridge SIW was
introduced in [40] (Fig. 3d): the modied ridge SIW is based
on a row of partial height metal cylinders located in the broad
side of an SIW and connected at their bottom with a metal
strip. A modied ridge SIW covering the frequency band
6.825 GHz was designed and fabricated (with 168%
bandwidth enhancement). A further improvement has been
obtained with the ridge SISW, where air-lled holes have
been added. In this case, a ridge SISW covering the entire

Fig. 3 Different topologies of SIWs

a
b
c
d

Substrate-integrated folded waveguide

Half-mode SIW
Substrate-integrated slab waveguide
Ridge SIW

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frequency band 7.130.7 GHz was designed and fabricated
(with 232% bandwidth enhancement). This last conguration
allows obtaining compact and broadband interconnects, which
are 40% smaller than a conventional SIW and exhibit a three
times broader bandwidth, and are suitable to fabrication by
using standard PCB or LTCC technology.

SIW passive circuits

Owing to the similarity between SIW structures and classical

rectangular waveguides, most of the planar (H-plane)
waveguide components have been implemented in SIW
technology. This solution usually permits a substantial
reduction in size and in weight of components if compared
to classical waveguide; moreover, losses of SIW
components are lower than in the corresponding microstrip
devices and there are no radiation and packaging problems.
SIW components are a good compromise between air-lled
rectangular waveguide and microstrip line, especially in the
mm-wave range, where microstrip is too lossy to design
high Q components.
3.1

Filters and couplers

Among the passive components, lters have received a

particular attention. A variety of lter topologies have
been proposed (Fig. 4): among them, a lter with inductivepost operating at 28 GHz [9] and a lter with irises
operating at 60 GHz [24] were designed and fabricated.
Subsequently, cavity lters with circular [13] and
rectangular cavities [41] were developed: they permit a
better design exibility and exhibit higher selectivity,
thanks to the cross-coupling that introduces transmission
zeros. A multi-layered structure was adopted in [42]: the
use of a two-layer substrate permitted the design of an
elliptic lter with four cavities operating in C band.
Compact and super-wide band-pass lters were presented in
[43]: owing to the use of an electromagnetic band-gap
structure in the ground plane, a band-pass lter covering the
frequency range 8.5 16.5 GHz was designed and tested.
While most of these lters operate in the microwave range,
lters operating at 60 GHz [24] and up to 180 GHz [25]
were also proposed.
Besides lters, several other passive components have been
developed in SIW technology. Among them, two
congurations of directional couplers were proposed: the
former, based on two adjacent SIW with apertures in the
common wall, was used to design 3, 6 and 10-dB couplers

Fig. 4 Different classes of SIW lters

a
b
c
d

Filter with inductive-post

Filter with iris windows
Filter with circular cavities
Filter with rectangular cavities and cross-coupling

[44]; the second conguration presents a cruciform shape,

and was adopted to design a super-compact 3-dB
directional coupler [45]. Planar SIW diplexers operating at
5 and 25 GHz were proposed [46, 47]. A magic-T [48],
six-port circuits [21, 26] and circulators [22] were also
implemented and experimentally veried.
3.2

Transitions

The transitions between planar transmission lines and SIW

structures represent another important element related to
SIW components. Several broadband transitions between
microstrip or coplanar waveguide and SIW have been
developed [49, 50] (Fig. 5). In particular, microstrip-to-SIW
transitions are typically based on a simple taper (Fig. 5a),
provided that the microstrip and the SIW structure are
integrated on the same substrate [49]. Recently, design
equations have been proposed for the fast implementation
of microstrip-to-SIW transitions [51]. Microstrip-to-SIW
transitions in a multi-layer substrate environment have been
proposed [52], to connect a microstrip implemented in a
thin substrate with a thicker SIW structure. The use of thick
substrates allows for reduced conductor losses in SIW
structures. Conversely, two solutions have been proposed
for coplanar-to-SIW transitions. The rst solution makes
use of a current probe (Fig. 5b): the current owing through
the probe generates a magnetic eld, which matches with
the magnetic eld inside the SIW structure [50]. Another
possible conguration was proposed in [53] and consists of

Fig. 5 Transitions between printed transmission lines and SIW

a Microstrip-to-SIW transition, based on a taper
b Coplanar-to-SIW transition, based on a current probe
c Coplanar-to-SIW transition, based on a 908 bend
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a coplanar waveguide with a 908 bend on each slot inside the
SIW structure (Fig. 5c). It is noted that using coplanar
waveguides may be convenient when thick substrates are
adopted to reduce conductor losses, and consequently the
use of microstrip lines is not possible. Finally, transitions
between air-lled waveguide and SIW structure have also
been proposed [54]: this transition is based on a radial
probe inserted into a tapered metallic waveguide.

fact, once a library of equivalent circuit models is available,

the direct synthesis of a component can be performed in a
short time by using conventional circuit computer-aided
design tools, with no need of electromagnetic full-wave
analysis codes. Equivalent circuit models of SIW
discontinuities have been adopted, in conjunction with a
space-mapping optimisation technique, for the fast design
of SIW lters [57].

3.3

Electromagnetic modelling

The development of SIW technology has stimulated

the application of several numerical techniques to the
electromagnetic modelling and design of SIW components.
Among them, full-wave numerical techniques have been
widely adopted. Both commercial electromagnetic software
and specically developed numerical techniques have been
used. Electromagnetic codes based on integral-equation,
nite-element or nite-difference methods have been
implemented [29, 31, 55]. In most cases, these methods
deal not only with metallic posts, but also with
inhomogeneous substrates (for instance, with air-lled holes
as in SISW).
A particularly efcient numerical technique for the modelling
of arbitrarily shaped SIW components is based on the BI-RME
method [31]. The BI-RME method, originally developed for the
modelling of classical waveguide components, allows for
characterising SIW components through their generalised
admittance matrix Y expressed in the form of a pole
expansion in the frequency domain, relating modal currents
and voltages of the port modes. Owing to this peculiarity, the
BI-RME method is used to determine in one shot the
wideband expression of the frequency response of SIW
components, thus avoiding repeated frequency-by-frequency
electromagnetic analyses. Consequently, the BI-RME
modelling of SIW components typically requires a few
seconds on a standard personal computer.
Another signicant advantage of the BI-RME method
is the possibility to directly determine equivalent circuit
models of SIW discontinuities [56]. Owing to the particular
representation of the admittance matrix, each term of the Y
matrix can be represented as the parallel of an inductance, a
capacitance and a number of LC-series resonators (Fig. 6).
The most important application of this method is the
determination of parametric multi-modal equivalent circuit
models, where the values of the lumped elements depend
on the geometrical dimensions of the component [56]. In

SIW active circuits

The implementation of active circuits using SIW technology

has received less attention compared to the reported
developments regarding passive circuits. Nonetheless, the
eld of active circuits without doubt opens numerous new
design possibilities for SIW technology towards a complete
SoS integration. Essentially, the design and optimisation of
active circuits consists of embedding active devices in
passive SIW circuits and interconnects thus utilising the
advantages of the technology such as, for example, low
loss, high isolation and compact size to achieve good
performance with low-cost fabrication techniques. Recent
developments in oscillators, mixers and ampliers are
provided in the following subsections.
4.1

Oscillators

SIW technology is particularly suitable for oscillator design

in terms of designing compact cavity resonators. In the
microwave and millimetre frequency range the oscillator
topologies are either of (a) feedback type, where a resonator
is embedded in the feedback loop of an amplier circuit, or
(b) reection type, where a resonator is coupled to an active
device port presenting a negative resistance. In Fig. 7,
illustrative block diagrams of various oscillator topologies
using SIW resonators are shown.
The rst reported that SIW oscillator used a rectangular
SIW resonator appropriately placed in the feedback path
between the input and output nodes of an amplier circuit
designed using the Agilent ATF36077 pHEMT transistor
[58]. The obtained oscillation frequency was 12.02 GHz
with an output power of 0 dBm. The phase noise of the
oscillator was measured to be 2105 dBc/Hz at an offset of
1 MHz from the carrier. Linear analysis was used to design
the oscillator. The feedback transmission lines and various
input and output lines of the oscillator circuit were
fabricated in microstrip technology and were connected to

Fig. 6 Equivalent circuit model of an iris-type discontinuity in SIW technology

a Geometry of the discontinuity
b Equivalent circuit model of the discontinuity, derived from the BI-RME method
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Fig. 7 Oscillator circuits in SIW technology

a Feedback oscillator
b Reection oscillator
c Pushpush reection oscillator

the SIW cavity using appropriately designed transitions. The

design rst demonstrated the capability of utilising SIW
technology to fabricate low-cost, compact, high Q resonator
structures for microwave oscillator circuits.
A reection type oscillator at 35.259 GHz based on a Gunn
diode was reported in [59]. A rectangular SIW cavity was also
used in this design, and the active device is integrated into the
edge of the cavity by removing a number of metallised via
holes, and placing the diode vertically in the substrate inside
an un-metallised via hole with a diameter size large enough
to accommodate the diode. A DC-bias network, including a
low-pass lter composed of high-low impedance microstrip
line sections, was implemented externally to the cavity
resonator in order to provide the bias. The oscillation
frequency was predicted using linear simulation. The
oscillator demonstrated an output power of 15.7 dBm, and a
measured phase noise performance of 291.2 dBc/Hz at an
offset of 100 KHz from the carrier frequency. The DC to
radio frequency (RF) efciency of the oscillator is 0.74%,
as the oscillator dissipates 1000 mA from a 5 V supply.
However, this work demonstrates the capability of
integrating active devices into the SIW cavity as well as the
suitability of this technology in order to manufacture
low-cost frequency sources in the millimetre wave range.
The authors also published a very similar oscillator at [60],
with the difference that the Gunn diode was placed near the
centre of the cavity and it was biased using a bond wire
which connected the diode anode to a pad forming a DCbias network implemented externally to the cavity resonator.
In a more recent publication, the authors of [61] proposed
a Gunn oscillator with frequency tuning capability by
integrating a varactor diode in addition to a Gunn diode
inside a rectangular SIW cavity. The varactor diode is
equivalent to a tunable capacitive post within the cavity and
consequently it permitted the authors to vary the resonance
frequency of their cavity by 3.16% at a centre frequency of
36.271 GHz. The output power varied from 9.3 to 11.3 dBm
over the tuning range. The oscillator had a low conversion
efciency of 0.55% at 11.3 dBm output power, while it
dissipated 2.448 W from a 4.8 V supply. The phase noise of
the oscillator was measured to be 2102.1 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz
offset at 36 GHz. The oscillator output was obtained by
tapping the signal of the resonant cavity using properly
designed SIW-to-microstrip transition.
Both previous oscillator designs relied on linear simulation
techniques in order to estimate the resonance frequency of the
oscillators. In [58] the oscillator design consisted of adjusting
the electrical length of the feedback path in order to obtain a
phase shift that is an integral multiple of 2p over the loop
while maintaining a positive closed-loop gain, and therefore
guaranteeing the oscillation condition [62]. The reection
oscillators of [59 61] were also designed using linear
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simulation. The oscillation frequency was predicted by

ensuring that the parallel combination of the resonator and
diode admittance had a negative real part and zero imaginary
part [63, 64]. Metallised via holes inside the SIW cavity
were used to control the admittance presented to the Gunn
diode and therefore set the oscillation frequency. Linear
simulation techniques are highly intuitive and provide a
means for estimating and investigating potential parasitic
oscillations in undesired frequency bands. In addition, they
do not require complicated non-linear models for the active
devices and can be applied using easily obtained Sparameter measurements of the passive resonator and the
active device for the selected bias conditions. However, they
only provide an estimate of the oscillation frequency due to
the fact that they rely on small signal operating conditions of
the active device, and they are unable to estimate the output
power or the harmonic content of the oscillator.
When a non-linear model of the active device is available,
non-linear simulation techniques such as harmonic balance
provide accurate estimates of both the oscillation frequency
and amplitude. Harmonic balance simulation presents an
inherent difculty in simulating oscillator circuits due to the
fact that the frequency of oscillation which represents
the basis of the Fourier expansion used in the harmonic
balance analysis is unknown a priori. This difculty can be
circumvented by introducing an additional (complex)
equation to the harmonic balance formulation corresponding
to the total admittance at some frequency looking into an
arbitrary circuit node must be equal to zero for the circuit
to oscillate [64]. The inclusion of this requirement in the
harmonic balance simulation allows one to introduce two
additional unknowns, which typically are the oscillation
frequency and amplitude at the selected node. This
observation was rst proposed by [65] and it can be easily
implemented in commercial simulators as demonstrated by
[66]. The use of harmonic balance analysis permits the
designer to optimise directly the oscillator amplitude and
frequency and its accuracy is limited only by the accuracy
of the available device models.
Two X-band oscillators using a rectangular SIW cavity
resonator were also reported in [67]. In this work, the
oscillators were designed by harmonic balance simulation
where the S-parameters of the cavities were imported
from an electromagnetic simulation. The proposed designs
consisted of a feedback and a reection oscillator
implemented in 0.508 mm thick Rogers 4003 substrate and
used the NEC NE3509 HJFET device. The feedback
oscillator had a resonance frequency of 12.64 GHz, output
power of 4.5 dBm with a DC to RF conversion efciency of
11.2% from a 1.5 V supply. The reection oscillator operated
at 13.03 GHz with an output power of 7.1 dBm and
efciency 16.3% from a 1.5 V supply. The phase noise of
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both oscillators was 2118 dBc/Hz at an offset of 1 MHz. In
both cases, the SIW resonator was coupled to the active
device using microstrip lines. The measured loaded Q of the
cavity used in the feedback oscillator was 61, whereas
the measured loaded Q of the cavity used in the reection
oscillator was 95.3.
A pushpush oscillator using a rectangular SIW cavity
was reported in [68]. In this design, a rectangular SIW cavity
with fundamental resonance at 14.75 GHz was used. Two
reection-type oscillators were designed based on the NEC
NE3210S01 HJFET sharing the same cavity in a topology
that is similar to the one illustrated in Fig. 7c. The oscillator
outputs were combined using a Wilkinson power combiner.
Harmonic balance simulation was used to predict the
oscillation frequency and amplitude. The transmission lines
coupling the active devices to the cavity and to the Wilkinson
divider were adjusted in order to ensure that the two
oscillators are synchronised in frequency and oscillate out-of
phase. As a result, the fundamental frequency components are
cancelled at the output and the second harmonic components
at 29.5 GHz are summed together. The measured output
power of the oscillator was 214.7 dBm, compared to a
simulated value of 29.6 dBm. The difference was attributed
to component yield variations which led to a 6 dB variation
between the second-harmonic component of the two
individual fabricated oscillators. The simulated DC to RF
conversion efciency of the pushpush oscillator was quite
poor 0.61% and it is attributed to the low second-harmonic
content of the designed oscillators. Optimised designs are
able to obtain second-harmonic content comparable to the
fundamental component, thus being able to demonstrate
higher efciency values. The oscillator had a phase noise of
2105.7 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset.
Even though notable oscillator circuits have appeared in the
literature, one can identify several research areas where
oscillator design can take advantage of SIW technology:
(i) Phase noise optimisation: Phase noise may be improved
by designing resonator cavities with higher unloaded quality
factors, utilising higher-order resonances and multiple
substrate topologies. Non-linear analysis can be used to
investigate the optimum loaded quality factor and coupling of
the resonator to the oscillator circuit in order to minimise
phase noise; (ii) High-frequency generation: The existing
publications have demonstrated the capability of fabricating
low-cost frequency sources in the millimetre wave range;
however, there is still a large room for improvement utilising
harmonic resonances and multiple device oscillators such
as N-push topologies in order to demonstrate frequency
generation in the frequency range of 100 GHz and above;
(iii) Tunable oscillators: Tuning ranges of 23% have been
demonstrated by placing a varactor diode inside the cavity.
Work is still necessary in order to obtain tuning bandwidths of
10% or more, while maintaining a high quality factor,
potentially using more than one varactor diodes or multiple
resonator topologies; (iv) Coupled oscillator arrays: Coupled
oscillators can be used in addition to high-frequency
generation (such as in an N-push topology) in order to
distribute a local oscillator (LO) signal with a desired phase
distribution to a transmitting or receiving array. Preliminary
work on coupled oscillator arrays in SIW technology has been
demonstrated in [69] and is further described in Section 5.2.
4.2

Mixers

Frequency conversion circuits have been demonstrated

by coupling active devices to hybrid passive circuits
IET Microw. Antennas Propag., 2011, Vol. 5, Iss. 8, pp. 909 920
doi: 10.1049/iet-map.2010.0463

implemented in SIW technology. An X-band single

balanced diode mixer using a 908 hybrid was proposed in
[70]. The mixer demonstrated a measured 6.8 dB insertion
loss for an RF signal of 10 GHz and a LO signal of 8 dBm
at 11.92 GHz. For a xed LO frequency of 12 GHz and
power of 8 dBm, the insertion loss of the mixer was better
than 10 dB over the 9 12 GHz band. The various signals
were coupled to the hybrid using SIW-to-microstrip
transitions.
A second single-balanced mixer using the same topology
was reported in [71], as part of a 24 GHz automotive radar
system-on-package front-end. The mixer had a 6.7 dB
conversion loss at an RF signal of 24.1 GHz, when a LO
signal of 7 dBm was applied at 22.6 GHz. The mixer return
loss was better than 10 dB within the 23 26 GHz band and
the radio frequency intermediate frequency (IF) isolation
was better than 17 dB within the 24 24.25 GHz Industrial
Scientic and Medical band of interest for the continuous
wave radar application.
Additionally, SIW lters can be used to improve the
performance of mixer circuits, although in this case the
technology is not applied in the mixer circuit design itself.
An example is a folded SIW lter with 3.3 dB insertion
loss and a 3-dB bandwidth of 1.45 GHz centred at
36.225 GHz which was used as an image rejection lter of
a monolithic microwave integrated circuit mixer operating
at 34 40 GHz [72].
Self-oscillating mixers are compact circuits providing the
functionality of both the oscillator and the mixer. They are
designed by appropriately biasing and loading oscillator
circuits in order to optimise conversion gain. The rst
reported self-oscillating mixer in SIW technology was based
on a feedback oscillator [73]. The oscillator used a
rectangular SIW cavity placed in the feedback path of a
eld-effect transistor (FET)-based amplier circuit. The
measured oscillation frequency was 14.347 GHz. The
designed circuit was a sub-harmonic mixer, where the
second harmonic of the oscillator was mixed with a
30.4 GHz RF signal to produce an IF at 1.7 GHz
approximately, and had a measured conversion loss of 8.6 dB.
Similarly to the oscillator circuit developments, there are
several areas where the application of SIW technology in
mixer circuit design can lead to improved performance, such
as (i) design of mixer topologies using compact hybrid
implementations involving multiple substrate layers for low
insertion loss and improved isolation, (ii) integration of active
devices directly in the SIW structures, (iii) high-frequency
implementations towards 100 GHz and above, where the
losses associated with microstrip lines can be prohibitive and
(iv) self-oscillating mixers demonstrating high-frequency
performance and optimised conversion gain by employing
non-linear simulation techniques. In addition, externally
injection locked or coupled self-oscillating mixers can be used
as phase-shifters in addition to frequency converters providing
an immediate application in phased-arrays.
4.3

Amplifiers

The rst reported amplier in SIW technology was presented

in [74]. The authors successfully demonstrated an X-band
amplier with 9 dB gain and less than 2 dB ripple over the
entire X-band, while eliminating the use of SIW-tomicrostrip transitions by coupling the active device directly
to input and output SIW sections. Compact interconnects
employing interdigitated series capacitors were used to
couple the device terminals to the SIW sections. In addition
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to DC blocking functionality, the printed series capacitors
were used to provide input and output matching in
combination with inductive irises consisting of plated
through via holes inside the SIW.
SIW structures have also been proposed in designing bias
networks for power ampliers [75], in order to both suppress
second and third-harmonic components from owing in the
bias line as well as support large DC currents. A typical bias
network transmission line in microstrip technology requires a
very thin high impedance line which may not be able to
support very large DC currents. Using a SIW section in the
bias network where the fundamental frequency and the second
harmonic are both below the cut-off frequency of the
fundamental propagating mode in the SIW ensures that they
are effectively cancelled at the input and output bias networks.
To additionally eliminate the third harmonic signal from
owing in the bias lines, shorted SIW sections with an
appropriately selected length are used. It should be noted that
using a SIW section in the bias line requires the use of
separate substrate layer segments at the input and output of the
amplier in order to avoid shorting the DC source to the
ground due to the metallised via holes of the SIW. The RF
signal is then coupled to the input and output substrate
sections using capacitors. The authors demonstrated the
performance of their proposed bias networks by designing
a 3.74.2 GHz power amplier using Eudynas C-band
power GaAs FET FLM3742-4F. Their amplier showed an
output 1 dB compression point of 35.1 dBm and the
suppression of the second and third harmonics were 65 and
58 dBc, respectively, showing an improvement of 22 and
13 dB over a test amplier using traditional microstrip linebased bias networks.
The potential of SIW technology in relation to highfrequency signal amplication is further demonstrated by a
Ka-band spatial power combiner amplier reported in [76].
Power combining amplier topologies consist of an input Nway power divider, followed by N-parallel amplier circuits
and an N-way power combiner. Utilising this architecture,
the authors of [76] demonstrated an eight device power
combining amplier in SIW technology. At the input, a
microstrip-to-SIW transition is used followed by a two-way
SIW to HMSIW power divider. The signal into each of the
two HMSIW branches is then split into four HMSIWto-microstrip transitions effectively resulting in an eight-way
power divider. Eight ampliers are then connected to each
of the microstrip interconnects. The output signals of the
ampliers are then combined using a second identical
structure used as an eight-way combiner. The amplier had a
19.5 dB small signal gain and a saturated output power of
30.6 dBm. The input and output return losses were better than
10 dB over the 33.535 GHz range. The measured power
combining efciency of the amplier was 72%.
There exist several areas where further developments are
expected in the application of SIW technology in amplier
design, including (i) minimisation of microstrip-to-SIW
transitions in order to optimise insertion losses and increase
efciency, (ii) multi-device ampliers and distributed
ampliers and (iii) recongurable ampliers with tunable
bandwidth and multi-band operation, to name a few.

5
5.1

SIW antennas
Passive antennas

In the last few years, there has been a growing interest

in SIW-based antennas. Several congurations have been
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proposed, starting from classical slotted-waveguides

antennas. The rst SIW antenna was based on a fourby-four slotted SIW array operating at 10 GHz [77]: this
antenna is obtained by etching longitudinal slots in the top
metal surface of an SIW. The feed network of this antenna
is based on microstrip power dividers, integrated on the
same substrate of the SIW antenna. A different topology is
the leaky-wave antennas, introduced in [78]: this antenna
exploits one of the fundamental characteristics of the SIW,
namely, its property to generate radiation leakage when the
longitudinal spacing of the metal vias is sufciently large.
Another leaky-wave SIW antenna, based on the TE20 mode
of the SIW structure, was proposed in [79] and provided
better performance compared to the classical leaky-wave
antenna based on the fundamental mode of the SIW.
Besides the classical waveguide-based antennas (with
apertures either on the top wall or on the side wall), other
antenna congurations have been proposed in the literature.
A modied Vivaldi radiator was proposed in [80]: it
consists of a dual V-type linearly tapered slot antenna, with
centre frequency at 36 GHz. Also, this antenna topology
appears particularly suited for integration in SIW technology.
Cavity-backed SIW antennas have been developed and
tested [81 83]. The simplest structure was proposed in [81]:
it consists of a slotted SIW cavity fed by a coplanar
waveguide. The whole antenna (including the SIW cavity
and the feed system) can be easily integrated on a single
dielectric substrate. Another solution was proposed in [82]: it
consists of an SIW cavity, slotted by a meander line and fed
by a microstrip line. Besides the integration of the complete
antenna and feed system on a single substrate, this solution
offers improved compactness of the overall antenna. A Kuband SIW cavity-backed antenna array was proposed in [83]:
in this antenna, the radiating element is represented by a
2 2 array of metal patches, backed by SIW cavities. The
cavities are realised by using metal vias, and the patches are
fed using microstrip lines that are centrally fed by a coaxial
probe. Cavity-backed SIW antennas result in planar antennas
with relatively high efciency (70% or more) and good
front-to-back ratio (up to 20 dB).
Finally, an H-plane sectoral horn antenna in SIW
technology was recently proposed in [84]: this antenna was
also combined with a dielectric loading, integrated in the
same substrate, which allows high gain and narrow
beamwidths both in the E-plane and in the H-plane. This
antenna topology has been used to form an array to obtain
higher gain and to form a one-dimensional mono-pulse
antenna array at 27 GHz.
5.2

Scanned and multiple-beam antennas

A signicant effort has been devoted recently to the

development of scanned and multi-beam SIW antennas.
This requires, as a consequence, the design of beamforming networks with increasing complexity. The aim of
these beam-forming networks is to achieve a desired
distribution of amplitude and phase coefcients at N output
ports of an RF network, to properly excite the radiating
elements and obtain the prescribed far-eld pattern.
A simple way to realise a multi-beam antenna is based on
the use of a parabolic reector antenna: without moving
the reector mechanically, the beam produced by a
parabolic reector antenna can be steered over a limited
angle by moving the feed off the reector focal point. An
SIW multi-beam antenna based on the parabolic reector
principle was proposed and implemented at 37.5 GHz [85]:
IET Microw. Antennas Propag., 2011, Vol. 5, Iss. 8, pp. 909 920
doi: 10.1049/iet-map.2010.0463

www.ietdl.org

Fig. 8 Active integrated antennas in SIW technology

a Cavity-backed active oscillator antenna
b Cavity-backed coupled oscillator antenna array

in this antenna, seven input ports generate a corresponding

number of output beams, and the parabolic reector is
implemented in planar form by an array of metallic vias.
The Rotman lens is another attractive solution to generate
multi-beam antennas, because of its simple design and
compact size. An SIW Rotman lens was adopted as a
beam-forming network in [86]. A multi-beam antenna was
implemented at 28.5 GHz with seven input ports and an
antenna array constructed by nine SIW linear slot arrays,
which can generate a corresponding number of beams along
one dimension. Several antennas were also grouped in
different ways to cover a 2-D solid angle with multiple beams.
A Blass matrix based on SIW technology was proposed in
[87]. The antenna, operating at 16 GHz, consists of a doublelayer structure, with a matrix of 4 16 cross-couplers.
Compared with the conventional waveguide construction,
this type of Blass matrix possesses the properties of lower
cost, easier fabrication and low prole.
A multi-beam antenna based on the Butler matrix was
implemented in [88, 89]: this solution is particularly
interesting for SIW implementation, because it is based on
a standard single-layer print circuit board process, which is
more economical for mass production than are the advanced
processes such as low-temperature co-red ceramic and
thick-lm processes. In this antenna, the four components
needed in the feeding network (908 hybrid coupler, crosscoupler, phase shifter and power splitter) are completely
implemented in standard SIW technology.
Finally, the Nolen matrix was proposed in SIW technology.
The Nolen matrix is a special case of the Blass matrix, where
the termination loads are suppressed. A 4 4 Nolen matrix
beam-forming network for multi-beam antenna applications,
operating at 12.5 GHz, was proposed and tested in [90].
5.3

Active antennas

The term active antenna here refers to circuit-antenna module

as dened by Gupta and Hall [91]. Therefore it includes active
integrated antennas where an active device is integrated in the
same substrate with the radiating antenna structure [92], as well
as an element in a quasi-optic array. In addition, it includes
antenna elements where an active device is used to modify
or recongure the properties of the antenna such as beam
direction, polarisation or bandwidth.
Compact, single-substrate cavity-backed slot and patch
oscillator antennas were proposed in [93, 94], respectively.
A non-detailed schematic of the proposed circuit is shown
in Fig. 8a. A square SIW cavity was used where the
antenna was etched on the metal layer on one side of the
substrate, and the antenna feed network and active device
were placed on the other side, thus minimising unwanted
IET Microw. Antennas Propag., 2011, Vol. 5, Iss. 8, pp. 909 920
doi: 10.1049/iet-map.2010.0463

effects on the radiation pattern of the antenna. The cavitybacked antenna serves as the resonator structure of the
oscillator. Furthermore, the ability to tune the oscillator
frequency was demonstrated in [95] by removing one via
hole from the cavity wall and introducing a varactor diode
in its place. By tuning the varactor capacitance, it was
possible to vary the resonance frequency of the oscillator by
approximately 2%.
Coupled oscillator antenna arrays can be used in power
combining as well as communication system applications
[96]. Modulation can be easily introduced in the array
through external injection, and beam-forming and beamsteering can be achieved by controlling the free-running
frequencies of the array elements (the frequencies of the
individual oscillator elements when they are uncoupled),
thus eliminating the need for phase shifters or a
complicated LO feed network. The authors of [68] proposed
the use of coupled SIW cavities in the design of coupled
oscillator arrays. Each array element is a cavity-backed
active oscillator antenna, and coupling among the array
elements is controlled by appropriately controlling the
coupling between the individual SIW cavities through the
use of a single or a double aperture. The proposed
architecture is illustrated in Fig. 8b.
A cavity-backed antenna with recongurable circular
polarisation has been proposed in [97]. A circular SIW cavity
is considered and a symmetrical crossed slot is etched in the
centre of the cavity wall, on the metal layer on one side of the
substrate. Four shorting posts are additionally placed inside
the cavity, near the slot edges and at points on the lines that
extend from the centre of the cavity and along the slot arms.
The posts are switched between a ground and an open state
using diodes in a series topology. A circularly polarised wave
is generated by altering the state of the posts corresponding to
one arm of the crossed slot, effectively introducing a degree of
asymmetry in the slot. By controlling the posts corresponding
to a different arm of the slot, one can switch between
orthogonal circular polarisation states and polarisation
diversity is achieved.
Active antenna arrays, where antenna arrays implemented in
SIW technology are placed in the same substrate comprised of
a single or multiple layers where various transmit and receive
modules are also integrated, have appeared in the literature
[70, 98, 99], demonstrating the potential of the technology
for complete SoS implementations.

6 Fabrication technologies for SIW

components
The technological aspects are a key point for the implementation
and development of SIW structures, especially for applications
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in the millimetre-wave frequency range, at 6090 GHz and at
even higher frequencies. Conventional PCB techniques have
been widely adopted to implement SIW structures, due to the
reduced manufacturing cost and the great design exibility. In
this case, the metal holes are created either by micro-drilling
or by laser cutting, and their metallisation is performed by
using a conductive paste or metal plating [9]. The PCB
technique exhibits an additional advantage, because it allows
the integration of the complete system (including microstrip or
coplanar circuitry, as well as the active elements) on the same
substrate with the same fabrication technique [12].
At higher frequencies radiation issues can arise, due to
some technological limitations: in fact, fabrication
constraints prevent the longitudinal spacing between metal
vias going below a certain value. A possible solution to this
problem was proposed in [26], where the via holes are
replaced by metallised slots in a circuit operating at 94 GHz.
LTCC technology has also been used in SIW
implementation. The availability of several layers and
the tiny dimension of the via holes permits implementation
of extremely compact SIW components. SIW lters in
LTCC technology were presented in [100, 101]: in these
lters, the SIW resonators are vertically stacked, so that the
lter size can be miniaturised.
SIW components operating above 100 GHz were fabricated
using photoimageable thick-lm materials, with excellent
dimensional tolerances and low dielectric loss in [25]. The
fabrication process is the following: rst, a uniform metal
layer is printed on an alumina substrate, to form the bottom
wall of the waveguide. Then, a 10 mm dielectric layer is
printed and photoimaged, forming the waveguide sidewalls.
This step is repeated to achieve the required thickness of the
SIW structure. Finally, a conductor layer is printed and
photoimaged to form the upper wall of the waveguides.
After printing and imaging, each layer is dried and red prior
to the processing of subsequent layers. SIW lters operating
at 180 GHz, fabricated by using this technology, were
designed and experimentally veried in [25].
The implementation of SIW antennas in a exible
substrate was proposed in [102]. The fabrication is based on
a technique called ion track technology and can be
summarised as follows: rst, Kapton foils are pretreated by
irradiation with heavy ions and subsequent wet etching. The
ions determine tracks in the material, and these tracks are
selectively etched during the wet etch step, to form pores.
Finally, the surface of the foil is irradiated and etched, and
the pores perforate the whole thickness of the foil. An
SIW-based slot array antenna in a exible PCB was
successfully demonstrated in [102].

Conclusion

This paper has presented the state-of-the-art of SIW technology:

the recent advances in the eld of passive components, active
components and antennas implemented in SIW technology
have been described and discussed. Issues related to the
modelling and design of SIW components have been
addressed, and the different technological solutions proposed
for the implementation of SIW components and circuits have
been presented.

Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge their colleagues and students,

who contributed to the development of SIW technology at
the University of Pavia, the Centre Tecnologic de
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Telecomunicacions de Catalunya and the Ecole Polytechnique

de Montreal. This work was partially supported by the
European
COST
Action
IC0803
RF/Microwave
Communication Subsystems for Emerging Wireless
Technologies (RFCSET). The work of M. Bozzi was also
supported by the Italian Ministry of the University under
project PRIN no. 2008HE84LJ. The work of A. Georgiadis
has been also supported by the Torres Quevedo Grant
PTQ-06-02-0555, and project TEC2008-02685/TEC on Novel
Architectures for Recongurable Reectarrays and Phased
Array Antennas (NARRA) of the Ministry of Science and
Innovation Spain.

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