A Broadband Wilkinson Power Divider Based on the Segmented Structure

This paper proposes a topology of a broadband Wilkinson power divider based on the segmented structure. The segmented structure is formed by many transmission line segments in shunt with grounded capacitors and series resistor- capacitor networks. Each transmission line segment has the length of a fraction of a quarter of the wavelength (or λ/4) and the summed length of all segments remains λ/4. The segmented structure resembles a multiorder matching network and can extend the operation bandwidth through concurrent matching at multiple frequencies. Theoretically, the operation bandwidth can keep increasing with the increased number of segments. Practically, the widest achievable bandwidth is limited by the implementable component values. The theoretical background of the proposed broadband topology is explained. The guideline of designing the proposed power divider is provided. A power divider prototype with the structure of three segments is designed and fabricated. The measurement results, matching the simulations, show the state-of-the-art -20-dB operation bandwidth of 101%, if compared with all the published Wilkinson power dividers having a total length of λ/4.