This paper presents a hybrid design of 1 × 2 and 1 × 4 arrays operating in 0.277–0.292 THz on 65 nm Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) technology. Each of the chips has an X-band input with 3 ×3 multiplier stages and connected at the output to an on-chip ring antenna. A wideband microstrip Wilkinson four-way and two-way power dividers have been developed on a multilayer printed circuit board to feed the array elements with proper radio frequency and direct current inputs. Demonstrating improvements in effective isotropically radiated power and in total radiated power compared to a single CMOS element, the hybrid integration approach proves effective in implementing coherent THz transmitter arrays. Theoretical and practical factors that reduce the radiated power compared with ideal arrays are also discussed.

We demonstrate a sub-terahertz (THz) and THz integration platform based on micromachined waveguides on silicon. The demonstrated components in the frequency range 225–325 GHz include waveguides, filters, waveguide vias, and low-loss transitions between the waveguide and the monolithic integrated circuits. The developed process relies on microelectromechanical systems manufacturing methods and silicon wafer substrates, promising a scalable and cost-efficient system integration method for future sub-THz and THz communication and sensing applications. Low-temperature Au/In thermo-compression and Au–Au laser bonding processes are parts of the integration platform enabling integration of millimeter-wave monolithic integrated circuits.

This paper proposes a novel T-shape electromagnetic bandgap (EBG) structure to suppress simultaneous switching noise (SSN) in mixed-signal systems. Noise is generated due to simultaneous switching multiple drivers in the digital ICs. It is called as SSN. It could propagate between power and ground planes of underlying PCB platform and interfere with the functionality of nearby RF/Analog ICs. So, the RF modules are isolated from the digital module for proper functioning of entire mixed-signal system. A high-impedance surface, called T-shape EBG has been implemented between digital and RF modules. It will exhibit the characteristics of bandgap for a wide frequency range to suppress the propagation of switching noise. A single unit-cell of T-EBG is periodically patterned over one side of the PCB and the other side is kept continuous. In this paper different characteristics of T-EBG have been simulated and verified with the measurement results. A 3 × 3 T-EBG layout provides an isolation of −40 dB from 0.72 to 6.39 GHz. A scaled version of T-EBG is used to shift the bandgap towards higher frequency range from 2.22 to 7.19 GHz. Also, a novel layout methodology has been proposed to broaden the bandgap from 2.02 to 18.84 GHz without reducing the thickness of dielectric substrate.

Different types of bondwire interconnect for differential chip-to-antenna and single-ended chip-to-chip interfaces are investigated. Two differential compensation structures for various lengths of interconnects are designed and experimentally evaluated using dedicated transmit and receive radar modules operating across a 110–156 GHz band. Measurement results demonstrate that a fractional bandwidth of 7.5% and a minimum insertion loss of 0.2 dB can be achieved for differential interconnects as long as 0.8 mm. Design and measurement results of an extremely wideband low-loss single-ended chip-to-chip bondwire interconnect that features 1.5 dB bandwidth from DC to 170 GHz and insertion loss of less than 1 dB at 140 GHz are presented as well. The results show that the well-established wire-bonding techniques are still an attractive solution even beyond 100 GHz. Reproducibility and scalability of the proposed solutions are assessed as well.

We report on the development of W-band (75–110 GHz) heterodyne receiver technology for large-format astronomical arrays. The receiver system is designed to be both mass producible, so that the designs could be scaled to thousands of receiver elements, and modular. Most of the receiver functionality is integrated into compact monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) amplifier-based multichip modules. The MMIC modules include a chain of InP MMIC low-noise amplifiers, coupled-line bandpass filters, and sub-harmonic Schottky diode mixers. The receiver signals will be routed to and from the MMIC modules on a multilayer high-frequency laminate, which includes splitters, amplifiers, and frequency triplers. A prototype MMIC module has exhibited a band-averaged noise temperature of 41 K from 82 to 100 GHz and a gain of 29 dB at 15 K, which is the state-of-the-art for heterodyne multichip modules.

This paper reports the test results of a small-scale prototype that implements a digitally beam-formed phased antenna array in the E-band. A four-channel dual-conversion receive RF module for 71–76 GHz frequency band has been developed and integrated with a linear end-fire antenna array. Wideband frequency-domain angle-of-arrival estimation and beam-forming algorithms were developed and implemented using Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) with Quadrature Phase-Shift Keying (QPSK) at 1 Gbps. Measured performance is very close to the simulated results and experimental data for an analogue-beam-formed array. This work is a stepping stone toward practical realization of larger hybrid arrays in the E-band.