With the introduction of 5G communication systems operating in the mm-wave frequency range, new opportunities in terms of multimedia services and applications will become available. For this to happen, several technical challenges from an antenna standpoint need to be addressed. The achievements of high-gain characteristics and agile beamforming with wide-scan capabilities are the main targets of the ongoing research on mm-wave antenna arrays. In this paper, an up-to-date overview of antenna array technology for wireless communications at mm-wave frequencies is given. Particular focus is put on the review of the state-of-the art and most advanced antenna array concepts for point-to-point and point-to-multipoint radio links at said frequencies. Various figures of merit are assessed for a comprehensive analysis and bench marking of the technical solutions investigated in the presented survey.
This article reviews the current state-of-the-art of millimeter-wave (mm-wave) antennas for communication and sensing applications in the D-band between 110 and 170 GHz. The most popular design techniques, including Antenna-on-Board (AoB), slotted waveguides, Antenna-in-Package (AiP) and Antenna-on-Chip (AoC), are described using relevant examples from scientific literature. Potential benefits and limitations of integration technologies, such as specialized packaging, chip post-processing steps and interconnects, are listed as well. The reported performances of all listed designs are compared against each other, taking the antenna size relative to operating frequency into account. This novel comparison indicates that small-scale integrated AiP and AoC designs can achieve competitive performance levels with short and low-loss interconnects.Index Terms-Antenna-in-Package, Antenna-on-Board, Antenna-on-Chip, D-band, millimeter-Wave This document is a result of the NEXTPERCEPTION project (www.nextperception.eu), which is jointly funded by the European Commission and national funding agencies under the ECSEL joint undertaking.
State-of-the-art design solutions for electronically scanned array antennas are mostly limited to microwave to low mm-wave frequency bands, while the demand for new designs at higher frequencies (i.e. frequencies beyond 100 GHz) is rapidly growing. We attempt to fill in this knowledge gap by presenting a new linear array antenna architecture as a building block of 2D arrays that can enable efficient beam steering and a simplified array design. This concept is based on the combination of a low-loss quasi-optical (QO) feed, providing predefined antenna port excitation, with 1-bit phase shifters which are co-integrated with the array antenna elements. In this study, we formulate the array design problem as minimization of the sidelobe level (SLL) through an optimum quasi-randomization of phase errors. An analytical expression for the optimum focal ratio of the QO feed has been derived to establish the relationships between the key design parameters. These results are validated through numerical simulations revealing that the optimum focal ratio leads to the minimum SLL.
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