Wideband High-Efficiency Circularly Polarized SIW-Fed S-Dipole Array for Millimeter-Wave Applications

A wideband high-efficiency millimeter-wave (mm-wave) circularly polarized (CP) array which is constituted by novel planar substrate integrated waveguide (SIW)-fed S-dipoles is presented in this communication. The proposed mm-wave CP S-dipole consists of two rotational symmetric curved arms and is fed differentially through aperture coupling, which features simple configuration and excellent performance. Detailed analysis is given to explain the operating principles of this element. It is noted that superior element performance including a wide impedance bandwidth of 43%, a wide 3 dB axial ratio (AR) bandwidth of 36%, and 1 dB gain bandwidth of 38% is achieved by the planar SIW-fed S-dipole. By feeding 64 in-phase S-dipole elements through a full-corporate SIW feeding network, a planar wideband highly efficient mm-wave $8 \times 8$ CP array is realized. To verify the design concept, a prototype operating at Ka-band is fabricated and measured. The measurement results indicate that the proposed array achieves a wide overlapped bandwidth of 27.6%, a high antenna gain of 25.2 dBic, and a high aperture efficiency of 89.9%. Attributed to the planar and robust array structure as well as its excellent performance, the presented array is a good candidate for various mm-wave applications.