MICROSTRIP TWO-SECTION DUAL-BAND IMPEDANCE TRANSFORMER

DESIGN WITH SPURIOUS MATCHING SUPPRESSION

Sio-Weng Ting1, Kam-Weng Tam1 and Rui P. Martins1, 2
1
Wireless Communication Laboratory, Faculty of Science & Technology,
University of Macau, Macao, China
2
on leave from Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisboa, Portugal

ABSTRACT matching frequency bands at nfo+(f2-f1)/2 and nfo+(f2-

f1)/2, for n = 3, 5, 7, 9, … etc. Since the suppression of
In this paper, a novel two-section dual-band impedance
transformer with embedded spurline sections is proposed. this intrinsic spurious-matching has not yet been
With this new structure, the intrinsic spurious matchings reported its detailed analysis can be considered of
at the 3rd and 5th harmonic frequency bands can be paramount importance for future multi-standard
significantly suppressed, whilst the matching at the two communications.
designed operating frequencies can be maintained. In order
to demonstrate the proposed transformer performance, a In order to retain the compactness and geometry
GSM dual-band (900 MHz and 1.8 GHz) impedance simplicity of the above two-section impedance
transformer was designed and implemented. From the transformer here it will be considered the possibility of
simulation and experimental results, the proposed embedding the spurline into the transformer, where the
transformer maintains the good matching of 35 dB at the manipulation of its length will control the corresponding
dual GSM frequency bands and suppresses all unwanted
matching upto its 5th harmonic band. zero characteristic [5, 6]. And, the introduction of such
an element could lead also to the elimination of
KEYWORDS — Dual-band, impedance transformer, unwanted matching whilst the fundamental matching is
transmission zero placement, spurline, spurious matching. kept unchanged.
Based on the above this paper proposes a novel dual-
band impedance transformer approach based on
I. INTRODUCTION embedded spurlines for spurious matching band
The latest multi-standard communication system suppression. Also, the extension of the spurline analysis,
developments usually need dual-band or triple-band in terms of its geometrical orientation and location will
RF/MW components to implement the required signal be included. The design of the proposed structure can be
processing, like in the case of the common dual-band derived from the conventional two-section impedance
mobile communication system. Here, the design of new transformer basic equations. Additional formulas and
components like the dual-band coupler, the dual-band guidelines for spurline physical parameters design will
bandpass filter, the dual-band impedance transformer also be presented. For verification, both simulated and
and others, has recently been addressed due to its measured results of a microstrip two-section dual-band
industrial importance. impedance transformer for GSM will be introduced and
compared with the behavior of a conventional structure.
Conventionally, the λ/4 impedance transformer is
used for matching a specific load at a single frequency; l1 l2
but may not be useful in a dual-band system. Recently, a
simple two-section dual-band impedance transformer
Z0 Z1 Z2 ZL
with total λ/3 length, shown in Fig. 1, was introduced
for matching at the frequency f1 and its first harmonic
2f1, with the numerical solution and analytical
formulation provided in [1] and [2], respectively.
Fig. 1. Two-section dual-band impedance transformer.
Besides the above harmonic matching, this two-section
dual-band impedance transformer was extended for the
operation at two arbitrary frequencies f1 and f2. On the II. DUAL-BAND SPURLINE IMPEDANCE
other hand, in [3, 4], a set of analytical design equations TRANSFORMER – ANALYSIS AND DESIGN
is given to characterize the two-section dual-band
impedance transformer; where it is also demonstrated
A. Two-Section Dual-Band Impedance Transformer
that the length of each section will be quarter-
[4]
wavelength at the center frequency fo for the two
designed frequencies (f1 and f2). However, the For the microstrip two-section dual-band impedance
transformer intrinsically suffers spurious matchings for transformer, as shown in Fig. 1, operated at the two
all odd harmonic frequency bands, and so has additional
designed frequencies f1 and f2, its parameters can be In the above section, it has been shown that the
determined as follows: transmission zero placements can be simply controlled
by adjusting the length of spurline. However, the
λ0 λ1 (1) physical location of the embedded spurline in an
l1 = l2 = =
4 2( r + 1 ) impedance transformer section does affect the reflection
at neighboring frequencies. To illustrate the spurline
location effect on the transformer matching
Z1 =
Zo
2t12
[Z L − Z 0 + ( Z L − Z 0 )2 + 4t14 Z L Z 0 ] (2) characteristics, a conventional quarter-wavelength
transformer embedded with a spurline section at
different position is studied. This quarter-wavelength
Z 2 = Z L Z 0 Z1 (3) transformer is designed to operate at 1 GHz and matches
where r = f2/f1 is the ratio of the two designed well with a 180 Ω resistive load and a 50 Ω source. The
frequencies; λ0 is the wavelength at the center frequency embedded spurline is of 1/5 total strip length so that the
fo = (f1+f2)/2; and the variable t1 is defined as 5th harmonics (i.e. 5 GHz) is suppressed. The
π f1 . simulation results of the spurline location-effect are
t1 = tan( )
2 f0 shown in Fig. 3.
l
Zoo /2, θo
B. Spurline Section Design for Transmission Zero g Zoe /2, θe
Placement w
s =
w
Fig. 2(a) shows a microstrip symmetrical spurline
section and its equivalent circuit [6]. The spurline (a)
section is equivalent to a transmission line with
characteristic impedance Zoe/2 and electrical length θe = l
(2πf/vpe)l in series with a short-circuited stub with la l lb
la l lb
characteristic impedance Zoo/2 and electrical length θo = =
(2πf/vpo)l; where l is the physical length of the spurline, f
g
is the frequency of interest, and vpo and vpe are the phase
velocities for odd- and even- modes respectively. Since (b)
the impedance of the short-circuited series stub will
become infinity when θo = π/2, that is when the length of l
spurline is la+l-g lb-l+g la+l-g l lb-l+g
l
l = v po 4 f (4)
=
From (4), it is shown that a transmission zero can be
created and the reflection will be maximized at some (c)
frequency f by controlling the spurline length. As such,
Fig. 2. (a) Spurline section and its equivalent circuit, (b)
embedding this spurline section into the microstrip two-
Spurline embedded (left-hand side configuration) transmission
section impedance transformer can achieve the spurious line and its equivalent circuit, (c) Spurline embedded (right-
matching frequency band suppression. hand side configuration) transmission line and its equivalent
circuit.
(
By using v p = λf and λ = c f ε re , the spurline )
physical length can be further re-expressed as a fraction
0
of the impedance transformer sectional length li:
f ε re (i = 1, 2) (5)
l = li 0 -5
f ε ore
where c is the velocity of light, ε re and ε reo are the -10
| S11| (dB)

effective dielectric constant and its odd-mode value.

-15

C. Spurline Geometrical Orientation and Location -20

1 2 3 4
According to the equivalent circuit of the microstrip Z0
-25
spurline section embedded in a transmission line, as Z1 ZL
shown in Fig. 2(b) and (c), it is found that there is no
-30
transfer characteristics difference due to the orientation 0 2 4 6 8 10
of spurline (left-hand side or right-hand side Frequnecy (GHz)
configuration) as long as the slot opened on the strip
edge is small enough (g << l), and its position and Fig. 3. Effect of Spurline location: Spurline located at
position 1 (thin dash line), position 2 (thick dash line),
length are unchanged. position 3 (thick solid line) and position 4 (thin solid line).
 In addition, the above two transformers were
From Fig. 3, the transformer shows different levels of implemented and measured. Their experimental
spurious matching at the 5th harmonic proximity. And it reflection coefficients are recorded in Fig. 6; where it
is observed that placing the spurline at the position-3 can be seen that the matching characteristics in the 3rd
(the slot is located at about 3/5 long of the strip length and 5th harmonic bands are suppressed to the level of 5
apart from the source) may cause minimum spurious dB and 7 dB respectively, whilst the matching of the
matching on the neighboring frequency, whilst the designed dual GSM frequencies is about 35 dB. As
matching at 5th harmonic frequency can be suppressed such, this confirms the proposed structure performance.
significantly. Moreover, the matching at the guard band between the
To take full advantage of the above spurline effects, two operating frequencies is also suppressed to a level
three spurline sections are embedded into the of 2 dB.
transformer to suppress the unwanted matching at 3fo
and 5fo. The final spurline is for matching level
suppression between the two designed frequencies f1 and 0
f2, so that the guard band between them is with good
performance.
-10

III. SIMULATED AND MEASURED RESULTS

| S11| (dB)
-20
To demonstrate the spurious matching suppression
capability of the proposed impedance transformer,
especially the lowest two harmonic frequency bands, the
-30
proposed and the conventional structure are designed for
the dual GSM band frequencies (900 MHz and 1.8 Conventional
Spurline
GHz) with a 50 Ω source and a 180 Ω resistive load. In
-40
order to simplify the overall spurline design process, 0 2 4 6 8
only the symmetrical spurline with equal strip width, Frequency (GHz)
coupling gap and the width of the slot opened on the
Fig. 5. Simulated reflection response for conventional two-
strip-edge (w = s = g) will be considered. section dual-band impedance transformer (thin dashed line),
These two microstrip impedance transformers are and for the proposed structure (thick solid line).
simulated with the MoM-based EM simulation package
[7] and implemented on the Rogers RO4003 substrate 0
with relative dielectric constant ε r =3.38 and thickness
h=1.524 mm. The layout parameters of the conventional
two-section dual-band impedance transformer are firstly
-10
evaluated subject to the above specification and the
design equations (1 - 3). Based on the analysis in section
|S11| (dB)

II, the proposed transformer, as shown in Fig. 4, is

-20
designed by choosing the lengths of the three spurline-
sections as lfo ≈ l2, l3fo = l1/3 and l5fo = l1/5 (for l1 = l2 =
34.92mm).
-30

Conventional
l5fo l3fo lfo Spurline

-40
0 2 4 6 8
Z0 Z1 l1 Z2 l2
RL Frequency (GHz)

Fig. 6. Measured reflection response for conventional two-

section dual-band impedance transformer (thin dashed line),
Fig. 4. Two-section dual-band impedance transformer with and for the proposed structure (thick solid line).
three-sections of embedded spurline.

Fig. 5 shows the reflection coefficient simulation of IV. CONCLUSIONS

the above transformers. It is obvious that the proposed
transformer has suppressed the spurious matching till its A novel two-section dual-band impedance transformer
5th harmonic band to a level of about 5 dB. The based on embedded spurline sections has been proposed
matching between 900 MHz and 1.8 GHz is also to suppress the spurious matching frequency bands at
suppressed to 0 dB. the higher harmonic frequencies and the unwanted
matching between the two operating bands. In order to
validate this novel structure, two prototypes microstrip REFERENCES
impedance transformers for dual GSM bands, using the [1] Y. L. Chow and K. L. Wan, “A transformer of one-third
proposed novel and the conventional two-section wavelength in two-section for a frequency and its first
structures were designed and experimentally harmonics,” IEEE Microwave Wireless Comp. Lett., vol.
characterized. The new transformer offers a spurious 12, pp. 22-23, January 2002.
matching elimination at the 3rd and 5th harmonic [2] C. Monzon, “Analytical derivation of a two-section
impedance transformer for a frequency and its first
frequency bands; whilst the matching of the designed harmonics,” IEEE Microwave Wireless Comp. Lett., vol.
dual GSM bands are kept at a level close to 35 dB. This 12, pp. 381-382, October 2002.
new method offers additional flexibility and improved [3] C. Monzon, “A Small Dual-Frequency Transformer in
performance in conventional two-section dual-band Two Sections,” IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech.,
transformer design. vol. 51, pp. 1157-1161, April 2003.
[4] S. J. Orfanidis, “A Two-Section Dual-Band Chebyshev
Impedance Transformer,” IEEE Microwave Wireless
Comp. Lett., vol. 13, pp. 382-384, September 2003.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT [5] R. N. Bates, “Design of Microstrip spur-line bandstop
filters,” Microwave, Optics and Acoustics, vol. 1. no. 6,
The authors would like to thank the technical pp. 209-214, November 1977.
assistance of Mr. Fai-Leung Wong and Mr. Wai-Wa [6] C. Nguyen, C. Hsieh and D.W. Ball, “Millimeter Wave
Choi; and the measuring equipment support of Printed Circuit Spurline Filters,” IEEE International
Microwave & Wireless Communication Laboratory of Microwave Symp. Dig., pp. 98 –100, 1983
[7] IE3D, Zealand Software Inc., Fremont, CA. March 2002.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong.
This work has been developed under the support of
the Research Grant RG055/02-03S/MR/FST, from the
Research Committee of the University of Macau.