WO2010028520A1 - Circuits et composants rf en matériaux mixtes - Google Patents

Circuits et composants rf en matériaux mixtes Download PDF

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Publication number
WO2010028520A1
WO2010028520A1 PCT/CN2008/072334 CN2008072334W WO2010028520A1 WO 2010028520 A1 WO2010028520 A1 WO 2010028520A1 CN 2008072334 W CN2008072334 W CN 2008072334W WO 2010028520 A1 WO2010028520 A1 WO 2010028520A1
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WO
WIPO (PCT)
Prior art keywords
component
superconducting material
superconducting
circuit
areas
Prior art date
Application number
PCT/CN2008/072334
Other languages
English (en)
Inventor
Corbett R. Rowell
Original Assignee
Hong Kong Applied Science And Technology Research Institute Co., Ltd.
Priority date (The priority date is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the date listed.)
Filing date
Publication date
Application filed by Hong Kong Applied Science And Technology Research Institute Co., Ltd. filed Critical Hong Kong Applied Science And Technology Research Institute Co., Ltd.
Priority to CN200880000109A priority Critical patent/CN101542764A/zh
Priority to PCT/CN2008/072334 priority patent/WO2010028520A1/fr
Publication of WO2010028520A1 publication Critical patent/WO2010028520A1/fr

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Classifications

    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H01—ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01Q—ANTENNAS, i.e. RADIO AERIALS
    • H01Q1/00—Details of, or arrangements associated with, antennas
    • H01Q1/36—Structural form of radiating elements, e.g. cone, spiral, umbrella; Particular materials used therewith
    • H01Q1/364—Structural form of radiating elements, e.g. cone, spiral, umbrella; Particular materials used therewith using a particular conducting material, e.g. superconductor
    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H01—ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01Q—ANTENNAS, i.e. RADIO AERIALS
    • H01Q7/00—Loop antennas with a substantially uniform current distribution around the loop and having a directional radiation pattern in a plane perpendicular to the plane of the loop
    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H01—ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01Q—ANTENNAS, i.e. RADIO AERIALS
    • H01Q9/00—Electrically-short antennas having dimensions not more than twice the operating wavelength and consisting of conductive active radiating elements
    • H01Q9/04—Resonant antennas
    • H01Q9/0407—Substantially flat resonant element parallel to ground plane, e.g. patch antenna
    • H01Q9/0421—Substantially flat resonant element parallel to ground plane, e.g. patch antenna with a shorting wall or a shorting pin at one end of the element
    • H—ELECTRICITY
    • H01—ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01L—SEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES NOT COVERED BY CLASS H10
    • H01L2924/00—Indexing scheme for arrangements or methods for connecting or disconnecting semiconductor or solid-state bodies as covered by H01L24/00
    • H01L2924/0001—Technical content checked by a classifier
    • H01L2924/0002—Not covered by any one of groups H01L24/00, H01L24/00 and H01L2224/00

Definitions

  • the present description relates, in general, to RF components employing superconducting materials and, more specifically, to RF components employing mixed materials.
  • Radio Frequency (RF) circuits/components are generally made of copper. Copper is cheap, it is plentiful, and it has fairly high conductivity and very low resistivity. In the antenna context, resistivity keeps the energy from being radiated out. The energy gets turned into heat instead, thereby lowering the efficiency of the antenna.
  • Copper is good for most components where the component size is roughly the size of the natural resonance, which usually occurs at ⁇ /4 or ⁇ /2 or ⁇ , where ⁇ is a wavelength.
  • the size of a component decreases relative to its operating wavelength, resistivity increases greatly.
  • loaded antennas such as helix antennas, which decrease the size of an antenna usually to a third or less of its resonant length.
  • Superconducting materials do not have resistivity (at least when the temperature of the materials drops below critical temperature, Tc). In theory, a superconducting component can provide a much higher efficiency than an all-copper component. Superconducting materials have a lot of issues that make them less than optimal for deployment, though. First, they are very expensive. Second, they require a cryogen to provide cooling down to Tc, e.g., Tc of some high-temperature superconductors is 92 0 K, and is lower for other superconductors, such as low-temperature superconductors. Third, superconducting materials are typically brittle, and it is difficult to shape superconducting materials into anything other than two-dimensional (2D) thin, flat tape or wire.
  • 2D two-dimensional
  • Another prior art system includes a filter bank with some filters made of superconducting materials and other filters made of conducting materials. Yet another prior art system includes a copper antenna embedded in a superconducting sphere or column to improve the antenna fields after they have left the antenna and before they go out into free space, similar to a lens effect.
  • these prior art systems that employ whole circuits or components made entirely of superconducting materials are hard to build because of the brittleness of superconducting materials, and are expensive to manufacture because of the high cost of superconducting materials.
  • an antenna element includes superconducting material in portions that have a high current density while other portions are made of conducting material.
  • An example method includes designing an RF circuit/component, ascertaining the current densities within the circuit/component, and replacing one more portions that have high current densities with superconducting material.
  • Various embodiments of the invention provide advantages over the prior art. For instance, some embodiments allow the same design freedom that is had with copper in making complex shapes and three-dimensional (3D) shapes, while at the same time providing performance characteristics of superconducting material.
  • FIGURE 1 is an illustration of an exemplary system adapted according to one embodiment of the invention
  • FIGURE 2 shows an exemplary system adapted according to one embodiment of the invention
  • FIGURE 3 shows an exemplary system adapted according to one embodiment of the invention
  • FIGURE 4 is an illustration of an exemplary coupling scenario according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • FIGURE 5 is an illustration of an exemplary simulated RF circuit design adapted according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • FIGURE 6 is an illustration of an exemplary design according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • FIGURE 7 is an illustration of an exemplary design according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • FIGURE 8 shows an exemplary patch antenna with slot design according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • FIGURE 9 is an illustration of an exemplary method adapted according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • FIGURE 1 is an illustration of exemplary system 100 adapted according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • System 100 includes a Planar Inverted F Antenna (PIFA) element with sections 101, 102, and 103.
  • Section 101 in this example, has the highest current density during operation of any of the three sections 101, 102, and 103.
  • section 101 is constructed of superconducting material
  • sections 102 and 103 are constructed of conducting material.
  • FIGURES 2 and 3 illustrate two other exemplary PIFA embodiments according to the principle described herein.
  • FIGURE 2 shows exemplary system 200 adapted according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • System 200 is a PIFA element with a slot, where section 201 (the portion surrounding the slot) includes superconducting material.
  • FIGURE 3 shows exemplary system 300 adapted according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • System 300 is a PIFA element with a meander line, where section 301 includes superconducting material.
  • the scope of the invention is not limited to PIFA antenna elements and, in fact, is not limited to antennas at all.
  • Embodiments of the invention can be adapted for use in any RF component, such as antennas, filters, amplifiers, circulators, dividers, couplers, transmission lines, and the like.
  • Various embodiments can take advantage of any superconducting material, as well as any conducting material.
  • some embodiments use Yttrium Barium Copper Oxide (YBCO), which is basically a ceramic with a very high critical temperature (at least for superconductors) at 92° K.
  • YBCO Yttrium Barium Copper Oxide
  • the same or different embodiments can use copper as a conducting material because it is easily soldered, it deforms in many different patterns, and it has relatively good electrical properties for use in RF components.
  • FIGURE 4 is an illustration of exemplary coupling scenario 400 according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • FIGURE 4 shows a close-up view of the superconducting material of section 101 (FIGURE 1) and how it is connected to the conducting material of sections 102 and 103.
  • Various embodiments of the invention couple the superconducting material to the conducting material in a way that provides for the best possible matching.
  • one option is a capacitive coupling.
  • a capacitive coupling technique includes placing the superconducting material so that it overlaps the conducting material by some margin, usually of 2-10% of the surface area of the superconducting material. In this manner, matching is controlled by the amount that the surface area is overlapped between the conducting material and the superconducting material. Such a technique is shown in FIGURE 4, where section 101 overlaps both sections 102 and 103.
  • the overlap with 103 is about 1-5 mm, which varies depending on resonant frequency, geometry, materials, and the like. Matching is also controlled by distance "d,” which can vary among embodiments. In some cases, ultrasonic welding can be used to mechanically adhere the materials together, thereby shrinking distance "d" to be very small.
  • FIGURE 5 is an illustration of exemplary simulated RF circuit design 500 adapted according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • Circuit design 500 provides a loop antenna of size ⁇ /50, where ⁇ represents a wavelength. Antennas of very small size often suffer from very low efficiency. In the case of design 500, an all-copper antenna would have an efficiency of about 9%, which is ascertained by simulation.
  • An example simulation program includes HFSSTM, available from Ansoft, which is an industry standard simulation program for RF circuits and antennas. In this example, the simulation also displays the strength of the magnetic field at various points on antenna design 500. The areas marked 501-503 have the highest magnetic field strength as well as the highest current densities of all areas on circuit design 500.
  • the simulation allows for the adjustments of parameters, such as materials, geometries, operating frequencies, and the like.
  • the first simulation is performed with an all-conductor parameter space, and areas of high current density are ascertained, such as areas 501-503.
  • the parameters of the design are changed to include a Perfect Electrical Conductor (PEC) at portions 501-503 to approximate behavior of superconducting materials.
  • An exemplary design is shown as circuit design 600 of FIGURE 6.
  • the simulation is run again, and there is a difference in the efficiency between an all-copper design and a design that replaces copper at portions with high current density. All-copper has a 9% efficiency; i.e., only 9% of the initial energy that goes in actually gets radiated outward. Design 600 has a 15% efficiency, so the result of replacing some areas with superconductor produces almost a doubling in efficiency.
  • a loop antenna is only one example, as embodiments of the invention can employ any of a variety of RF circuit components with any geometry. Some geometries will give a large performance gain, whereas other geometries do not give much performance gain at all. For instance, a regular patch antenna that does not have any areas of inductive loading (and, therefore, lacks areas of very high current density) will typically not experience a large increase in efficiency by replacing high current density portions with superconducting portions. By contrast, a patch antenna with a slot may be expected to experience a large efficiency increase.
  • FIGURE 7 shows exemplary simulated patch antenna design 700 with a slot. In this simulation, the circled area shows areas with high current densities.
  • FIGURE 8 shows exemplary patch antenna with slot design 800, wherein portions 801 and 802 are PEC to approximate the effect of superconductor material. Simulation shows that design 800, sized at ⁇ /20 has an efficiency of about 60%.
  • embodiments of the invention can employ any technique for ascertaining current density.
  • a prototype is built out of conducting material. Then, the magnetic field is probed using a metal instrument just above the surface of the prototype as the prototype radiates RF energy. The probe is connected to a network analyzer, which shows the areas with the highest magnetic field strength.
  • a user can work through the mathematics by, e.g., using a general math computer program, such as MATLABTM.
  • FIGURE 9 is an illustration of exemplary method 900 adapted according to one embodiment of the invention.
  • Method 900 can be performed, for example, a person or group of persons creating and/or manufacturing RF designs.
  • an RF circuit (or RF circuit component) is designed.
  • the RF circuit or component can be any of a variety of RF current-carrying objects, such as an antenna, a filter, a divider, a coupler, a transmission line, or the like.
  • step 902 current densities in a plurality of portions of the RF circuit are ascertained.
  • operation is simulated with the RF circuit constructed of conducting (rather than superconducting) material.
  • the simulation maps current density in the RF circuit and provides an indication of efficiency.
  • Step 902 can also be performed by building a prototype and measuring magnetic field strength, analyzing mathematical models, and/or the like.
  • step 903 the RF circuit is redesigned so that a first portion includes superconducting material and so that a second portion includes non-superconducting material, wherein the first portion has a higher current density than does the second portion.
  • some conducting portions that have higher current densities than other portions are replaced with superconducting portions.
  • Step 903 does not require that all high current density portions are replaced with superconducting material, only that one or more portions with higher current densities are replaced with superconducting material.
  • step 904 current densities in the redesigned RF circuit are ascertained.
  • Step 904 may also include ascertaining an indication of efficiency as well. Typically, efficiency in the redesigned circuit will be higher than in the original circuit without superconductor material.
  • the redesigned RF circuit is manufactured.
  • the RF circuit can be manufactured using of any of a variety of conductors (e.g., copper, aluminum, etc.) and superconductors (e.g., YBCO, Bismuth Strontium Calcium Copper Oxide (BSCCO), etc.).
  • superconductors e.g., YBCO, Bismuth Strontium Calcium Copper Oxide (BSCCO), etc.
  • cold copper is used instead of superconducting material.
  • Cold copper is copper that is cooled to 2-3°K, and it has similar properties as superconducting ceramic materials.
  • Cold copper embodiments include, but are not limited to, embodiments wherein a component is made entirely of copper and some or all of the copper is cooled using a cryogen, as explained below.
  • One manufacturing technique includes building the circuit on a film substrate, such as a film substrate that comes with superconducting material.
  • a film substrate such as a film substrate that comes with superconducting material.
  • An example of such a film includes flexible PCB, hard PCB (e.g., FR4), fluoropolymers (e.g,. TEFLONTM), and the like.
  • Other substrates can be used as well (e.g., LaAlO), especially those that do not crack or deform when exposed to very low temperatures.
  • Various embodiments also include a cryogenic cooling system with the circuit during manufacture and/or deployment.
  • a cryogenic cooling system with the circuit during manufacture and/or deployment.
  • liquid nitrogen can often be used to provide cooling.
  • embodiments may use liquid helium or other very low temperature liquids.
  • cryogenic cooling systems may provide for cooling very large portions of the device or may focus on small areas where the superconducting material is located.
  • steps 901-904 are performed by a Research and Development (R&D) group
  • step 905 is performed by a manufacturing group different from the R&D group.
  • Embodiments of the invention may include one more advantages over the prior art. For instance, some prior art systems include constructing the entire system from superconducting material. Such prior art systems are very expensive. Furthermore, superconducting materials have limitations in the shapes that they can take. For example, superconducting materials are usually formed in long, narrow wires and are typically not ductile and, therefore, are limited to two-dimensional structures based on long and narrow shapes. Other prior art solutions mix superconducting components and conducting components, e.g., in a bank of filters making some filters out of superconducting materials and other filters out of conducting materials. Once again, such systems are expensive. Furthermore, the discrete components made out of superconducting material are limited to two-dimensional shapes.
  • some embodiments of the present invention treat a component itself on the component level and address the portions of the component that benefit the most from using superconducting material.
  • some embodiments save costs by minimizing the amount of superconducting material used.
  • more complex shapes, including three-dimensional shapes can be made by manipulating the conducting portions.
  • embodiments of the invention offer increased performance over traditional, all-copper antennas, especially for very small or loaded antennas.

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  • Superconductor Devices And Manufacturing Methods Thereof (AREA)

Abstract

Un composant radiofréquence (RF) comprend un matériau non supraconducteur et un matériau supraconducteur. Selon l'invention, le matériau supraconducteur est placé dans une zone, ou plus, du composant RF de telle sorte que les zones qui contiennent le matériau supraconducteur conduisent une plus forte densité de courant que les zones qui contiennent le matériau non supraconducteur.
PCT/CN2008/072334 2008-09-11 2008-09-11 Circuits et composants rf en matériaux mixtes WO2010028520A1 (fr)

Priority Applications (2)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
CN200880000109A CN101542764A (zh) 2008-09-11 2008-09-11 混合材料的rf电路和元件
PCT/CN2008/072334 WO2010028520A1 (fr) 2008-09-11 2008-09-11 Circuits et composants rf en matériaux mixtes

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Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
PCT/CN2008/072334 WO2010028520A1 (fr) 2008-09-11 2008-09-11 Circuits et composants rf en matériaux mixtes

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WO2010028520A1 true WO2010028520A1 (fr) 2010-03-18

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WO (1) WO2010028520A1 (fr)

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* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
FR3069962B1 (fr) * 2017-08-01 2020-09-25 Primo1D Antenne a plaque pour coupler un terminal d’emission-reception a un dispositif rfid

Citations (4)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
JPH09246616A (ja) * 1996-03-06 1997-09-19 Seiko Epson Corp 超伝導素子から構成される回路
US6317003B1 (en) * 1999-03-15 2001-11-13 Fujitsu Limited Radio-frequency amplifier, and radio communication system using it
US7307045B2 (en) * 2002-11-07 2007-12-11 Ntt Docomo, Inc. Signal switching device
US20080061778A1 (en) * 2006-09-08 2008-03-13 Masaya Takahashi Antenna coil for nmr probe and wire rod for same and nmr system

Patent Citations (4)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
JPH09246616A (ja) * 1996-03-06 1997-09-19 Seiko Epson Corp 超伝導素子から構成される回路
US6317003B1 (en) * 1999-03-15 2001-11-13 Fujitsu Limited Radio-frequency amplifier, and radio communication system using it
US7307045B2 (en) * 2002-11-07 2007-12-11 Ntt Docomo, Inc. Signal switching device
US20080061778A1 (en) * 2006-09-08 2008-03-13 Masaya Takahashi Antenna coil for nmr probe and wire rod for same and nmr system

Non-Patent Citations (1)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Title
TAKAYUKI NISHIDA ET AL.: "Detection Properties of Slot Antenna Coupled YBCO Microbridges Based on Vortex Motion.", IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON APPLIED SUPERCONDUCTIVITY, vol. 13, no. 2, June 2003 (2003-06-01), pages 1017 - 1019 *

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