Antena Saw
Antena Saw
Antena Saw
AbstractWireless SAW RFID sensors offer several advantages over similar silicon technology that include passive operation, radiation hardness, and the ability to operate in extreme
temperatures. Due to these unique material and device properties,
NASA has shown considerable interest in passive, wireless SAW
sensors for ground and space flight operations. Several embodiments of SAW sensors have been well established in literature,
but often the limiting factor on device size and performance is
the tag antenna. Therefore, in order to develop a unified sensor
target, a discussion of design principles and tradeoffs for both
the SAW device and antenna will be presented in this paper.
Antennas designed and fabricated will be presented, including
a simple disk monopole, a planar open-sleeve dipole, and an
on-wafer meandered dipole, with a discussion on gain, size,
and bandwidth. The evolution of the antenna design is toward
smaller antennas that minimize tradeoffs. The eventual wafer
level integration of the antenna allows the sensor application
to exploit some of the known SAW substrate advantages and
has application in high temperature or strain sensors. Example
orthogonal frequency coded (OFC) temperature sensors on YZLiNbO3 for use at 250 and 915MHz will be used as device
examples. By properly designing the combined antenna/SAW
target matching, insertion loss can be minimized and range
increased. Experimental results on the integration of several
sensor targets will be presented. Work presented is a foundation
for a realizable wireless, multi-sensor platform.
occupied by an electrically small antenna dictates its bandwidth and radiation efficiency, as described by Wheeler [4].
Wheeler described the radiation quality factor, Q-factor, of an
electrically small antenna as being inversely proportional to
the volume in which it occupies. Therefore, as the physical
size of the antenna is decreased the bandwidth of the antenna
will also decrease as more reactive energy is stored. The
antenna radiation efficiency also benefits from a decrease
in stored energy and therefore an increase in gain is also
expected. Accordingly, a tradeoff must be made in the design
of the antenna based on the gain, bandwidth, and size. The
following discussion will first outline the design considerations
for the OFC SAW transducer, including bandwidth and input
impedance, which relate to the antenna design. The design
of the SAW device is important for conjugate impedance
matching to the antenna for a lower overall sensor insertion
loss. Sample antennas will then be presented in order of
decreasing physical size, concluding with an example antenna
integrated directly onto the SAW substrate. The goal of the
paper is to illustrate the progression of the research toward
a more implementable sensor through decreased tag size and
insertion loss.
I. I NTRODUCTION
This work is partially supported by a NASA Graduate Student Researchers Program (GSRP) fellowship and NASA KSC STTR-II contract
#NNX09CB69C.
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(1)
(2)
0
Given that
, the above equation shows that for
a given bandwidth the impedance of the transducer is fixed
along a constant Q-factor arc on the Smith chart. In order to
manipulate the impedance of the transducer the only parameter, 1 order, that can be manipulated is the beam width. In
order to minimize the reflection at the SAW/antenna interface,
without external matching, the transducer will ideally lie at
the point on the Q-arc 90 from 0 , assuming the antenna is
matched directly to 0 .
(3)
(4)
Fig. 1.
Schematic diagram of a 5 chip OFC tag with relative grating
periodicity shown for each chip. The two identical reflector banks are used
to extract a differential delay for various sensing applications.
Fig. 2. Fabricated disk monopole antenna for use with 250MHz OFC SAW
devices. The antenna is 350 tall, and has a ground plane that is 450
304
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Magnitude (dB)
10
15
20
200
220
240
260
Frequency (MHz)
280
300
Fig. 3.
S11 frequency response of the disk monopole antenna before
matching, solid line, and after matching, dashed line. Antenna gain measured
after matching was experimentally found to be > 2 throughout the band
of interest.
The same techniques described above were used to conjugately match the SAW device directly to the matched
monopole antenna. The relatively low center frequency of
the system allows for easier lumped element tuning of the
impedances. The same antennas were also employed as the
transmit/receive antennas for a transceiver system used to
wirelessly extract temperature. Results from a temperature
extraction performed at a transmit antenna to sensor separation
of 3 are shown in Fig. 4. As shown the SAW sensor is
able to accurately track the ramp up and gradual decrease of
temperature.
140
Temperature (C)
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
0
20
40
60
Reading Number
80
100
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Marchand and double-y baluns that provide a wideband transition between balanced and unbalanced transmission lines
were reviewed in [10]. In [11] the balun was simplified and
used as a matching network to match a dual-band antenna to
50. These design guidelines were used to implement a good
transition between CPS and microstrip lines, while maintaining
fractional bandwidth. The width of the CPS was chosen to be
wide for use as the ground plane for the microstrip line and
for use as an extended microstrip matching network for the
sensor. Final gap and width of the CPS were fixed at 0.5mm
and 25mm, respectively. The microstrip feed and open stub
were then designed to match the antenna to a 50 load at
915MHz.
Fig. 6 compares the antenna reflection coefficient of the
IE3D simulation to that of the fabricated antenna. There
exists a slight shift in the center frequency of the fabricated
antenna that can likely be attributed to IE3D simulating an FR4
substrate that is infinite in length and width. The shift should
not adversely affect the application performance as the 2:1
VSWR bandwidth is 16%. Maximum gain measurements were
performed, along the antenna boresight, outside of an ideal
anechoic chamber and found to vary between 1dB and 3dB
throughout the band of interest based on Friis transmission
equation. A slight increase in the directivity of the antenna, as
compared to a typical dipole antenna, is expected due to the
parasitic sleeve acting as a small reflector.
0
Simulated Response
Experimental Response
Magnitude (dB)
5
X: 870.6
Y: 9.995
10
X: 1019
Y: 9.993
15
20
Fig. 7. Fabricated antenna and SAW device presented for size reference.
The opaque LiNbO3 substrate is bonded inside the gold SMA package. The
microstrip network is facing up in this picture.
.
(6)
=
+
Maximum power is transmitted between the antenna and
the SAW transducer when the impedances are conjugately
matched, or when = 0. A second harmonic 915MHz OFC
device was fabricated with a 200 beam width, and matched
to the discussed dipole antenna. The calculated reflection coefficient at the reference plane mentioned previously is plotted
below in Fig. 8. As shown there is significant attenuation of the
lowest chip at approximately 865MHz. Improvements could be
made by matching at around 900MHz and then both the lowest
and highest chips would experience only slight attenuation, or
by using a different transducer structure. Overall the antenna
demonstrated performs quite well for the application, and can
also be used as the transceiver antenna.
V. M EANDERED D IPOLE A NTENNA ON L ITHIUM N IOBATE
25
750
800
850
900
950
Frequency (MHz)
1000
1050
Fig. 6. Antenna reflection coefficient comparison between the IE3D simulation, dashed line, and experimental results, solid line, for the open-sleeve
dipole antenna. The overall 2:1 VSWR bandwidth of the antenna is 16% at
a center frequency slightly higher than 915MHz. The shift shown should not
affect the intended sensor application.
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Magnitude (dB)
5
10
15
20
25
30
850
900
950
Frequency (MHz)
1000
(7)
295
0
5
Magnitude (dB)
10
15
20
25
30
35
800
Simulated Response
Experimental Response
850
900
950
Frequency (MHz)
1000
1050
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
Fig. 10.
Antenna reflection coefficient comparison between the IE3D
simulation, solid line, and experimental results, dashed line, for the on-wafer
meander line dipole antenna.
f1
f3f5f2 f4
Fig. 11. S21 measurement of the integrated sensor, with on-wafer antenna, interrogated at a separation of 25. The device chip sequence is 1 3 5 2 4 .
VI. C ONCLUSION
In this paper several example antennas were presented for
use with wideband SAW sensors at center frequencies of 250
and 915MHz. Orthogonal frequency coded SAW sensor design
guidelines were discussed, and example devices at both center
frequencies were utilized for use with the designed antennas. A disk monopole antenna was used with a transceiver
system for extraction of temperature at a distance of 3.
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