Substrate-integrated antennas on silicon

Antennas are essential components of the wireless communication systems. They enable the transfer of signals through unbounded or open space. Such transfer is crucial when one or more components of the communication system are mobile, for example, Bluetooth connectivity, cellular networks, satellite, aircraft and marine communications, etc. Radar systems provide another example where signals propagate in open space. In the last decade, wireless data transfer has become a hot spot of the high-frequency integrated-circuit (IC) research and technology. The monolithic IC technology, which is traditionally 100% "wired", has been touching on the subject of wave propagation due to pervasive interference and parasitics in the high-speed and RF/microwave ICs. However, the limitations of the traditional on-chip interconnects have prompted research on the feasibility of wireless chip area networks realizing inter-chip and intra-chip communications. The former refers to communication between chips while the latter refers to communication within a chip. These advances have prompted the development of a variety of integrated on-chip antennas suited for the common silicon technology. The applications span frequencies from several Giga-hertz well into the Tera-hertz range. In this chapter, a comprehensive coverage of the integrated antennas on silicon is provided. However, this research area is so rich that what the chapter includes can serve only as an introduction and an overview. The interested reader should follow up with the reference list, which we endeavored to make as exhaustive and up-to-date as possible. © 2012 Elsevier Inc.