Design of a Novel Microstrip Ultra-Wideband Power Divider for WLAN and Sub-6 GHz 5G Applications

Abstract

In this work, a novel power divider/combiner based on microstrip technology is investigated and designed for ultra-wideband wireless applications. The design process adopted for this power divider consists of modifying the planar transformers of the conventional power divider using the open artificial transmission technique. The power divider was designed on the basis of the theoretical equations of the open stub technique. It is simulated and optimized using the ADS and CST Microwave Studio solvers. As the simulation results, over the operating band, a bandwidth of 3000 MHz between 1 GHz and 4 GHz was achieved, along the entire band. This gave a maximum return loss of -28 dB at the center frequency and an insertion loss of about 3.5 dB, while maximum isolation of -38 dB was obtained across the output terminals. On the other hand, a prototype of the proposed power divider, fabricated on an FR4 substrate using microstrip technology, gave results confirming those of the simulation. In addition, the final structure considerably reduced the overall dimensions to 75% less than the traditional power divider. Therefore, the proposed power divider could be a suitable solution for wireless applications including 5G, WiMAX, WIFI, and Bluetooth.