Mode-Selective Transmission Line for Chip-to-Chip Terabit-per-Second Data Transmission

The recently developed mode-selective transmission line (MSTL) is proposed and exploited as an alternative approach to accommodate the growing and future ultrafast interconnects requirements of ultralarge-scale integration for high density, speed, performance, and bandwidth (BW). A parametric study is performed to optimize the MSTL structure for high-speed global interconnects and to provide high-performance signal integrity. Picosecond and rectangular pulse propagations on MSTL are examined, and pulse distortion, broadening, ringing, and reflection are characterized. An eye diagram is also shown to examine the jitter and noise. Due to our limited low-cost printed circuit board (PCB) fabrication accuracy, the frequency-domain measurement is carried out up to 110 GHz. Our optimal fabricated MSTL structures show an ultrawide absolute BW covering dc, maintain more than 200% relative BW while transmitting around 90° bends, and achieve a measured crosstalk of better than -45 dB over the entire band. Time-domain characterizations imply that the PCB-based MSTL accommodates data rates greater than 200 Gb/s. This technology allows, for the first time, the transmission of ultrahigh-speed electrical signal and picosecond pulse transmission through global interconnects with much lower dispersion and loss than today's technologies.