Validation of the Reference Impedance in Multiline Calibration With Stepped Impedance Standards

This article presents a new technique for evaluating the consistency of the reference impedance in multiline thru–reflect–line (TRL) calibration. During the calibration process, it is assumed that all transmission line standards have the same characteristic impedance. However, these assumptions are prone to errors due to imperfections, which can affect the validity of the reference impedance after calibration. Our proposed method involves using multiple stepped impedance lines of different lengths to extract the broadband reflection coefficient of the impedance transition. This reflection coefficient can be used to validate the reference impedance experimentally without requiring fully defined standards. We demonstrate this method using multiline TRL based on microstrip structures on a printed circuit board (PCB) with an on-wafer probing setup.