Modeling and Analysis of Sub-Millimeter-Wave Graphene Switches for On-Wafer Coplanar Transmission Lines

Abstract

We present an analysis of graphene loaded transmission line switches. Namely, we propose equivalent circuit models for graphene loaded coplanar waveguides and striplines and examine the switching performance under certain design parameters. As such, the models account for the distributed effects of electrically-large shunt switches in coplanar waveguides and we use the Babinet’s principle to derive the respective models for the coplanar stripline transmission lines. Using these models, we identify the optimum design of graphene switches based on transmission line characteristic impedance, scaling factor, graphene shape, and topology (series or shunt). We vary these parameters and obtain the insertion loss and ON/OFF ratio. Τhe extracted results can act as the design roadmap toward an optimum switch topology and emphasize the limitations with respect to fabrication challenges, parasitic effects, and radiation losses. In our models, we use measured graphene values (sheet impedance) instead of theoretical equations, to obtain the actual switching performance. Finally, the proposed equivalent models are crucial for this in-depth study; since, we simulated more than 2,000,000 configurations, a computationally challenging task with the use of full-wave solvers