A PNEUMATICALLY CONTROLLED CAPACITIVE SWITCH

作者：Wu Billy^*; Okoniewski Michal; Hayden Chris

来源：Microwave and Optical Technology Letters, 2014, 56(2): 489-493.

DOI：10.1002/mop.28103

• RF switches
• pneumatic control
• reconfigurable devices

The design and fabrication process of a unique pneumatically controlled capacitive switch is described. The switch, developed for reconfigurable antennas, presents a low-loss alternative switching mechanism, and avoids the issue of a complicated biasing layout associated with electrostatic actuation in the conducting layer. The closed state of the switch is created by a movable copper-coated solid slug that bridges a gap in a microstrip line with capacitive coupling. The basis of the switching mechanism is pressurized air causing the physical displacement of the slug inside a confining dielectric channel. Repeatable switching between open and closed states by pneumatically controlling the position of the slug was demonstrated with the fabricated switch. The minimum pressure required to move the slug was measured. This switch was measured from 0.5 to 15 GHz using a Thru-Reflect-Line calibration to de-embed the coax-to-microstrip transitions. Insertion loss of 0.2 dB and isolation of 25 dB have been achieved at 5 GHz. The successful fabrication and measurement of the switch demonstrates the viability of applying this technology in reconfigurable antenna designs.

• 出版日期2014-2