Non-toxic liquid metal microstrip resonators

In this paper, we report for the first time the design and fabrication of non-toxic liquid metal (Galinstan) half-wavelength (¿_g/2) microstrip resonator. Patterning techniques of Galinstan microstrip resonators are presented. Resonators of different lengths are measured to cover a frequency range of 3-20 GHz. We have characterized the conductivity of Galinstan by matching the measured quality factor with finite element model of the resonators. The conductivity of Galinstan is found to be 3.83 ± 0.16 × 10⁶ S/m. The liquid metal holds great promises as a low contact resistance, highly reliable, high temperature tolerant material. This work will benefit future implementations of Galinstan based RF/Microwave reconfigurable devices and systems with high reliability.