Research and Development on Phase-Shifting Surfaces (PSSs)

Nicolas Gagnon1, Aldo Petosa1, and Derek A. McNamara2

Advance Antenna Technology Communications Research Centre Canada 3701 Carling Avenue, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K2H 8S2 E-mail: {nicolas.gagnon, aldo.petosa}@crc.gc.ca
1

School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science University of Ottawa 800 King Edward Avenue, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1N 6N5 E-mail: mcnamara@eecs.uottawa.ca
2

Abstract
Phase-shifting surfaces (PSSs) developed in recent years are reported. Research and development on these phaseshifting surfaces are set in the historical context of prior-art free-standing lensing devices, as well as in the context of recent studies performed by other research groups. In addition, initial work on a phase- and amplitude-shifting surface (PASS), an extension of the phase-shifting surface, is demonstrated in a beam-shaping application. Keywords: Focusing; lens antennas; lenses; microwave antennas; periodic structures

1. Introduction

igh-gain antennas are required for long-range communication systems. Traditional high-gain antennas include reflectors and lenses, or arrays of low-gain elements. Each technology has its strengths and weaknesses. In short, reflectors are bulky and may suffer from feed blockage. Lenses have no feed blockage and are more tolerant of fabrication errors, but they are bulkier and heavier than reflectors. Arrays of radiating elements such as microstrip patches are of lower cost and flat, but their performance is limited due to losses in the feed network, especially at higher frequencies.

the Communication Research Centre Canada, in close collaboration with the University of Ottawa. Since then, the concept has been applied to the design of ultra-thin lenses having comparable efficiency to a shaped dielectric lens, the leading conventional technology. In this paper, we first provide a brief historical review of lenses and related technologies, from soon after World War II to the present. We then present the phaseshifting surface concept and its implementation, followed by a selection of prototypes that we have developed to demonstrate phase-shifting surface performance and capabilities. The paper ends with a general discussion presenting the current and future challenges of phase-shifting surface development, followed by a conclusion.

For more than two decades, considerable effort has been made in developing printed reflectarrays, i.e., flat reflecting structures made of microstrip antenna elements [1, 2]. Because reflectarrays are thinner and lighter than reflectors, they are good candidates for high-gain antenna substitutes for reflectors. Even though efforts have been made towards finding a similar alternative for lenses, there has been limited success in finding really practical solutions. One advancement in this field is the so-called phase-shifting surface (for which we use the acronym PSS), the development of which started in 2008 at
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2. Historical Review
Microwave collimating lenses first used as antenna elements were made from homogeneous dielectric material, and were based on the transposition of optical lenses in the microwave frequency range [3]. Despite providing a high aperture efficiency, they suffered from major physical drawbacks: they were thick, heavy, bulky, and expensive to fabricate.
ISSN 1045-9243/2012/$26 2013 IEEE 29

In this section, we present various efforts carried out from the 1940s to the present to find alternative technologies to make lensing devices more attractive, i.e., thin, light, low cost, and efficient.

2.3 1980s to 1990s: Microstrip Elements

The use of microstrip elements allowed for the first true thin, flat implementation of a phase-correcting free-standing device [13, 14]. The concept makes use of front and back layers of resonant microstrip patch antennas, connected by varying lengths of transmission lines. The length of each transmission line is carefully adjusted at every location on the surface in order to perform an overall lens function, i.e., to obtain the desired phase transformation. Although novel, the concept suffers from complexity of fabrication [13] and high quantization error.

2.1 1940s to 1950s: Metallic Waveguide Lenses and Artifi cial Dielectric Lenses
The first attempt to reduce the weight of microwave lenses made use of parallel conducting plates, used as hollow waveguides to control the phase velocity of the electromagnetic waves [4, 5] passing through the lens. In this configuration, the wave passing through the plates has a higher phase velocity than that of a wave in free space (whereas for dielectric materials, the phase velocity is lower than in free space). Stepped constructions, similar to Fresnel lenses, were also implemented. Despite the weight reduction, the thickness problem remained. These lenses also only worked for one orientation of linear polarization. Artificial dielectric lenses, consisting of thin, parallel dielectric layers containing two-dimensional arrays of small metallic implants in order to achieve a desired effective dielectric constant, were also proposed for weight reduction [5, 6]. An artificial dielectric lens is not thinner than its bulky dielectric counterpart of equivalent dielectric constant: the weight reduction is achieved by using a light-weight host material, such as foam, which is lighter than a solid dielectric. Once again, the thickness problem remained.

2.4 1990s to 2000s: Artifi cial Dielectric Lenses Made of Variable-Size Elements
The artificial dielectric concept received further attention in the 1990s and early 2000s, mostly with the development of devices made of variable-size elements. In [15], variablesize metallic implants throughout the aperture of the lens were used. Since a single layer was not enough to achieve sufficient phase correction, many parallel layers were inserted in cascade, spaced by thick layers of low-dielectric-constant material. Although this resulted in a flat lens, the thickness remained particularly high. Instead of using metallic implants in a low-dielectricconstant host, the work presented in [16] used perforation of a higher-dielectric-constant host. The perforated regions of the dielectric material had a lower effective dielectric constant compared to that of the host material. However, the fabrication process involving numerous perforations was rather complicated and time-consuming, thereby limiting the practicality of the perforated lens.

2.2 1950s to 1980s: Microwave Holography, Kinoforms, and the Detour-Phase Concept
From the mid-1960s to the mid-1980s, there was limited research on microwave lenses. However, the 1960s and early 1970s represented the golden age of holography [7]. Freestanding structures used at microwave frequencies for introducing a desired phase-shift profile were of great importance, not only in lens antenna research but also in microwave holography. Milestone papers on microwave holography include [8, 9]. Although the previously cited papers were general, it is also worth mentioning the work performed on the so-called detourphase concept, in which the phase is controlled by means of moving the position of lines or slits within a hologram grating [10, 11], and the kinoform, which is similar to a hologram but operates only on the phase (assuming a constant amplitude) [12]. However, both the detour-phase devices and kinoforms suffer from a lack of practicality due to the mechanical complexity of implementing the phase shifting.

2.5 2000s: Transmitarrays

A transmitarray is a free-standing structure that is composed of an array of multiple discrete elements used as a transmitting device [17]. The name is inspired by the reflectarray, but the device is used as a transmitting surface rather than a reflective surface. When made out of printed metallic elements, both the reflectarray and the transmitarray are flat. Just as a reflectarray can emulate a conventional reflector, a transmitarray can emulate a conventional lens. However, a single layer is not enough to realize the needed range of phase shift: as a result, many layers are used in cascade. In addition, these layers need to be precisely separated in order to avoid performance degradation, and so the assembly process is complicated. Although it does not allow for achieving an optimum thickness reduction, it can be significantly thinner than a dielectric lens.

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2.6 Recent Years: Ultra-Thin Designs, SubWavelength Elements, and Enhanced Capabilities
In recent years, not only did the present authors propose the phase-shifting surface concept and demonstrate its feasibility [18-23], but researchers from around the world have presented different solutions. In [24], a microwave lens using non-resonant sub-wavelength elements was reported. Although a promising technology, its design required a large number of layers. In [25], a flat thin microwave polarizer lens based on multiple resonances was proposed. This configuration used the same number of layers as [18-22], but the element spacing of half a free-space wavelength resulted in a higher phase-quantization error, similar to the technologies reported in [13, 14]. In [26], a microwave array lens made of elements with different orientation was presented. This configuration had the advantage of offering polarization agility. Similar to [24], a large number of layers was required. Additional recent studies included significantly more complex configurations that were needed for reconfigurable transmitarrays [27-29]: the latter topic is not covered by this review.

ure 2. As can be seen in Figure 3a, the strip elements allow for continuous variation of the conducting element dimensions (and hence phase) along the x axis for reducing the quantization error, while the elements are discretized along the y axis. The resulting configurations are polarization sensitive, requiring that the electric field be polarized along the y axis. As shown in Figure 3b, when using square elements these are discretized along both axes in the xy plane. The resulting configurations are polarization insensitive, even with arbitrary polarization roll angle [19]. The rectangular conductive element of Figure 2b was not used in the designs presented in this paper; however, it constitutes an interesting element that could allow for polarization versatility or polarization transformation. Further details are provided in Section 7.7.

3.2 Electromagnetic Modeling

The structures were modeled as unit cells in an infinite periodic structure, with appropriately located PEC (perfect electric conductor) and PMC (perfect magnetic conductor) boundary conditions, shown in Figure 2, used to mimic an infinite periodic structure. These boundary conditions enforced a normally incident plane wave onto the phase-shifting surface. Along the z direction, the simulation domain was terminated by perfectly matched layers (PMLs). These Finite-Difference Time-Domain (FDTD) simulations were conducted using the commercially available software EMPIRE XCcel by IMST [30]. The simulations were conducted at Ka band with a design frequency of 30 GHz, a unit cell dimension of s = 3 mm, and a substrate relative permittivity of r = 2.2 . The thickness, h, depended on the number of layers: its value was as indicated in the caption of Figure 1. Note that the two-, three-, and fourlayer configurations were respectively 0 20 , 0 10 , and 3 0 20 thick (where 0 is the free-space wavelength), and so constituted ultra-thin devices compared to shaped dielectric lenses. Furthermore, the thickness was comparable to alternative technologies [24-26]. In order to reduce the simulation time, no ohmic loss or dissipation loss was assumed in the model. In prototyping, low-loss material was used as the dielectric and highly-conductive copper was used as the conductor.

3. Phase-Shifting Surface Concept

In this section, the concept of a phase-shifting surface is thoroughly described.

3.1 Geometries
A phase-shifting surface consists of layers populated by conducting shapes of variable size, spaced by thin dielectric sheets. Figure 1 shows different layer configurations of phaseshifting surfaces. Different conductor shapes are available. Figure 2 shows a selection of conductive elements that could be used for implementing a phase-shifting surface; the reader can ignore the designations PEC and PMC until Section 3.2. In traditional transmitarray designs, layers are designed individually and then cascaded to produce a reasonable phaseshift range. Consequently, a significant spacing is required between adjacent layers in order to avoid undesired capacitive coupling, which would then compromise the performance of a transmitarray layer. Unlike transmitarrays, the conductive layers of phase-shifting surfaces are closely spaced and treated as an entire structure, taking into account the strong capacitive coupling between layers and using it to achieve a reasonable phase-shifting range. Furthermore, this allows for independent control of the transmission amplitude, thereby ensuring high transmission amplitude for applications requiring this, such as high-gain lensing devices. Figure 3 shows two different approaches used in our implementations: strip elements and square elements. They were generated from a periodic layout of the elements in FigIEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine, Vol. 55, No. 2, April 2013

3.3 Electric-Field Distributions

This section specifically considers the simulation of the three-layer configuration, shown in Figure 1b, of the symmetrical type, in which a3 = a1 . A sample case was selected as an example, which had conductor dimensions a1 = 2.55 mm and a2 = 2.85 mm, leading to a high transmission amplitude and a phase shift of 180 relative to the bare-substrate case (which had a1 = 0 mm and a2 = 0 mm). The boundary conditions enforced an incident propagating plane wave normally incident on the phase-shifting surface element with the electric-field polarization along the y axis. Figure 4 presents the field-distribution results. Away from the structure, the electric-field den31

a)

b)

c)

Figure 1. Side views of different layer congurations of phase-shifting surfaces developed at 30 GHz: (a) two-layer ( h = 0.5 mm or 0 20 ); (b) three-layer ( h = 1 mm or 0 10 ); (c) four-layer ( h = 1.5 mm or 3 0 20 ). Values of s = 3 mm and r = 2.2 were used. The dielectric is shown in grey and the metal is shown in black.

a)

b)

c)

Figure 2. Front views of unit cells showing conductive elements that could be used as phase-shifting surfaces: (a) square, (b) rectangle, (c) strip. The dielectric is shown in grey and the metal is shown hatched.

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a)

a)

b)

b)

c)

Figure 3. Front views of uniform phase-shifting-surface periodic structures: (a) strip elements, (b) square elements. The dielectric is shown in grey and the metal is shown hatched.

Figure 4. Simulated total electric-eld distributions for the symmetrical three-layer phase-shifting-surface case with a1 = 2.55 mm and a2 = 2.85 mm at 30 GHz: (a) the prole of the structure (white is air, gray is r = 2.2 , black is metal); (b) a surface plot of E y in dB(V/m); (c) a surface plot of Ez in dB(V/m).

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sity component, Ez , was zero, and only E y existed. At observation points close to and inside the phase-shifting surface, the electric field, Ez , became nonzero due to the presence of conductors, with large values between the conductive strips, resulting in strong capacitive coupling of the series type. The E y component was strongest at the strip edge along the y axis (as expected for an electric field normal to an edge), resulting in edge capacitive coupling of the shunt type between the conducting shapes on adjacent unit cells on the same layer. Furthermore, it is important to mention that the incident wave used in this analysis had Ex = 0 and, since the unit-cell analysis assumed no physical variation along the x axis, there was no Ex present at any location. Figure 4 shows that the electric-field magnitude had almost constant (and similar) levels as a function of position on both the front (left) and back (right) of the phase-shifting surface, with no clear standing wave present. This was characteristic of a high transmission amplitude and a low reflection amplitude. Because it was highly transmissive, we concluded that this case was a good candidate to be integrated into a phase-shifting surface free-standing lensing device.

Figure 5. The equivalent circuit model for the symmetrical three-layer phase-shifting surface.

a)

3.4 Equivalent Circuit Model

The equivalent circuit model presented in Figure 5 was derived from the geometry of the symmetrical three-layer configuration presented in Figure 1b and the electric fields shown in Figure 4. The inductance, L, was given by the dielectric material properties only. C1 and C2 were given by the dielectric material properties and the shunt capacitance resulting from the edge coupling between conductors on the same layer. C3 was given by the series coupling between conductors on different layers. The component values were extracted using a broadband minimization technique between the circuit model and the full-wave simulations, using Agilent ADS [31]. For the case of Figure 4, the component values were as follows: L = 0.596 nH, C1 = 0.032 pF, C2 = 0.079 pF, and C3 = 0.023 pF. Using the above-mentioned component values, the broadband behavior of the equivalent circuit of Figure 5 was plotted in Figure 6, along with the full-wave simulation results. An excellent agreement was obtained from dc to 40 GHz, which confirmed the validity of the circuit interpretation.

b)

3.5 Database Simulation Results

For each configuration presented in Figure 1 having a conductive element as shown in Figure 2, a database of complex transmission coefficients as a function of the ai dimensions can be generated. As an example, the database results

Figure 6. The transmission coefcient for the symmetrical three-layer phase-shifting-surface case with a1 = 2.55 mm and a2 = 2.85 mm: (a) magnitude in dB; (b) phase in degrees; full-wave simulations; + equivalent-circuit model.

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4. Implementation
The phase-shifting surface free-standing lensing devices presented in Section 5 were all fed by a pyramidal horn located at a chosen focal point, as shown in Figure 8. The focal point was located at a distance F from the center point of the phaseshifting-surface free-standing lensing device. The diameter is denoted by D. The same applied for the other technologies, such as dielectric shaped lens, dielectric phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate, and Fresnel zone plate, presented for comparison in Section 5. The thickness, which was the thickness of the phaseshifting surface mentioned in Section 3, is denoted by h. The phase-correcting pattern along the phase-shiftingsurface free-standing lensing device is determined as follows. First, the aperture is divided into unit cells, as shown in Figure 9. For square elements, x = y =s ; for strip elements, y = s , and x is made as small as possible in order to ensure a smooth, continuous variation of the strips width. The required phase, , at each unit cell is then determined using the expression [21]

Figure 7. The amplitude of the transmission coefcient and normalized phase for different values of a1 and a2 obtained from FDTD simulations of a symmetrical three-layer stripelement phase-shifting-surface conguration at 30 GHz: xed a1 value as a function of a2 ; xed a2 value as a function of a1 . The values of a1 are shown in italics, and the values of a2 are shown in bold (the units are mm).

( ) =

2 F 1 cos , 0 cos

(1)

where 0 is the free-space wavelength, and is the angle of incidence, shown in Figure 8. Once the required phase over the aperture is known, the corresponding local physical dimensions of the conductor shapes, denoted by ai , are obtained graphically

Figure 8. A side view of a horn-fed phase-shifting-surface free-standing device for an antenna application.

corresponding to a symmetrical three-layer strip element for which a3 = a1 is presented in Figure 7, in the form of a plot of amplitude as a function of normalized phase of the transmission coefficient, with corresponding values of a1 and a2 labeled on the plot. The phase was normalized relative to the bare-substrate case, as mentioned in Section 3.3. High-gain free-standing phase-correcting lensing devices need to have maximum transmission amplitude, corresponding to the data cases located at the top end of the vertical axis in Figure 7. We concluded that this configuration database allows for a phase-shift range of more than 300 without significantly compromising the transmission amplitude. It was therefore a good candidate for realizing phase-shifting-surface free-standing lensing devices.
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Figure 9. The quantization of the aperture of a phaseshifting-surface free-standing lensing device into rectangular cells. The aperture is represented in gray. xm and ym denote the local position of the cell with index m.
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(e.g., using Figure 7), or by using a look-up table algorithm. The pattern of the phase-shifting-surface free-standing device is then generated using the previously found local physical dimensions of the conductors in order to achieve the desired aperture phase distribution for a specific application. This approach is similar to the approach used in the design of reflectarrays [1]. For phase-only correcting designs, e.g., highgain microwave lenses, the transmission amplitude is maximized over the aperture by properly selecting the conductor pattern. This is done so that the aperture efficiency of the antenna is not compromised. Because of the enormous electrical size of the phaseshifting-surface free-standing devices, it is not possible using reasonable computer resources to perform an analysis of the complete final structure using full-wave electromagnetic simulations, since the number of unknowns is too high. We have therefore relied on a methodology analogous to the one reported in [1].

5.1 Hybrid Phase-Correcting/AmplitudeCorrecting Fresnel-Zone-Plate Antenna

The simplest phase-shifting-surface design is one that uses a symmetrical two-layer configuration, as shown in Figure 1a, for which a2 = a1 . This leads to optimal cost effectiveness and thickness reduction. Such a free-standing two-layer phase-shifting-surface device is not capable of achieving a complete phase-correction cycle: it can realistically achieve half a cycle (i.e., 180) [23]. It is thus possible to combine its phase-only correction capabilities with binary amplitude-only correction, in which case the destructively adding wave is blocked from propagating, as used in Fresnel zone plates (FZPs) [32]. While designing this device, we used Equation (1) over half a phase cycle, an opaque zone over a quarter phase cycle, and a transparent zone over a quarter phase cycle [23]. We called such a device a hybrid lens [23], since it used both phaseshifting-surface and Fresnel-zone-plate principles. A photograph of the hybrid lens is shown in Figure 10, which shows that a strip metallization pattern was used. The measured H-plane co-polarization far-field radiation patterns of the hybrid lens antenna are shown in Figure 11, along with the pattern of an equivalent Fresnel-zone-plate antenna. The Fresnel zone plate transparent and opaque zones were etched off a thin copper-clad FR4 layer. We had previously confirmed that the FR4 dielectric had negligible influence on the electromagnetic performance of the Fresnel-zoneplate antenna [18]. The realized boresight gain at 30 GHz was 27.7 dBi for the hybrid lens antenna, compared to 23.7 dBi for the Fresnel-zone-plate antenna. In the E and H planes, the cross-polarization level (not shown) was 37 dB below the maximum gain level for the hybrid lens antenna, compared to 32 dB for the Fresnel-zone-plate antenna [18, 23]. The realized boresight gain over frequency is presented in Figure 12 for the hybrid lens antenna and the Fresnel-zone-plate antenna, clearly showing the superior performance of the hybrid lens antenna throughout the band. However, the hybrid lens was no more costly or difficult to fabricate than the Fresnel zone plate.

5. Proof of Concept of Phase-ShiftingSurface Free-Standing Lensing Devices

In this section, various selected prototypes made using the phase-shifting-surface technology are presented. The results of these different prototypes revealed that the methodology works satisfactorily. Before describing these cases, we present some general comments: 1. 2. 3. All designs were done for a focal-length-to-diameter ratio of F D = 0.5 . All phase-shifting-surface free-standing devices had a circular aperture, with diameter D = 153 mm. For practical reasons, x = 0.1 mm for strip-based designs. Note that this was within the etching tolerance of our in-house photolithographic process. The feed horn used for the devices presented in this section was a WR-28 pyramidal horn, having a gain of approximately 11 dBi and half-power beamwidths in the E and H planes of approximately 50 at 30 GHz. Its cross-polarization level was very low, and was below the noise floor of our farfield anechoic chamber in both the E and H planes (approximately 30 dB below the maximum gain level).

4.

5.2 Fresnel Lens Antenna

Improved electromagnetic performance can be obtained using a symmetrical three-layer configuration, as shown in Figure 1b, for which a3 = a1 . Using this approach, a phaseshifting-surface Fresnel lens was designed using Equation (1) as a substitute for a conventional dielectric plano-hyperbolic shaped lens. As for the hybrid lens of Section 5.1, a strip metallization pattern was used. The conventional lens was made of Plexiglas, with a backing section used to maximize the realized gain at the design frequency [18]. The phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens was in fact quasi-Fresnel, because as mentioned in Section 3.5, it did not allow us to achieve the entire 360

Table 1 presents some key results for the phase-shiftingsurface free-standing lensing devices, as well as some conventional technologies also mentioned later in this section and used for comparison. In addition, comparison charts for gain difference, weight ratio, and thickness ratio are also presented.

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Table 1. A summary of results for lensing antennas presented or mentioned in this paper (best gain performance from left to right). Illustration of the freestanding lensing device Phaseshiftingsurface Fresnel lens antenna Polarizationindependent phaseshiftingsurface phase correcting Fresnel zone plate antenna Polarizationindependent PSS phasecorrecting FZP antenna Polarization independent Multilayer etching + bonding Rogers RT/ duroid 5880 3 1.05 mm 44.9 g Square Phaseshiftingsurface phase correcting Fresnel zone plate antenna Dielectricstep phasecorrecting Fresnel zone plate antenna Hybrid phasecorrecting/ amplitudecorrecting Fresnel zone plate antenna

Antenna description

Dielectric planohyperbolic lens antenna

Fresnel zone plate antenna

Short name /Acronym Polarization dependency Fabrication technique Dielectric material Number of conductive layers Total thickness Weight Unit cell type Lensing correction type Gain @ 30 GHz Maximum gain

DPHLA

PSS Fresnel lens antenna Polarization dependent Multilayer etching + bonding Rogers RT/ duroid 5880 3 1.07 mm 45.6 g Strip Quasicontinuous phase correction 29.9 dBi 30.4 dBi @ 30.4 GHz

PSS phasecorrecting FZP antenna Polarization dependent Multilayer etching + bonding Rogers RT/ duroid 5880 3 1.06 mm 45.2 g Strip

Dielectric phasecorrecting FZP antenna Polarization independent Machining

Hybrid lens antenna Polarization dependent Double-sided etching Rogers RT/ duroid 5880 2 0.55 mm 22.5 g Strip Hybrid (half continuous phase, half amplitude corrections) 27.7 dBi 28.6 dBi @ 31.9 GHz

FZP antenna

Polarization independent Machining

Polarization independent Single-sided etching FR4 1 0.127 mm 5.5 g N/A

Plexiglas N/A 41.876 mm 435.3 g N/A Continuous phase correction 30.1 dBi *

Lavarock N/A 8.0 mm 250.9 g N/A

90 phase correction

90 phase correction

90 phase correction

Amplitude correction

29.9 dBi 30.0 dBi @ 29.9 GHz

29.8 dBi 29.9 dBi @ 29.8 GHz

28.9 dBi 29.6 dBi @ 31.8 GHz

23.7 dBi 24.0 dBi @ 29.8 GHz

Related [18, 21] [21, 22] [19] [18, 21] [18, 30] [23] [18] papers * The dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna (DPHLA) has a frequency-independent nature: its gain increases with frequency since the electrical size increases. Consequently, no value was quoted for the maximum gain.

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Figure 10. A photograph of the hybrid phase-correcting/ amplitude-correcting Fresnel zone plate. The device had a circular shape. The metal was copper and appeared as light reddish brown. The dielectric shown exposed between the printed copper was Rogers RT/duroid 5880, and it was black.

Figure 12. The measured realized gains at boresight of the hybrid lens antenna and the Fresnel zone plate antenna: + Fresnel zone plate antenna; O Hybrid lens antenna; feed horn.

Figure 11. The H-plane co-polarization far-eld radiation patterns of the hybrid lens antenna and the Fresnel zone plate antenna, obtained from far-eld measurements at 30 GHz: + Fresnel zone plate antenna; O hybrid lens antenna; feed horn.

Figure 13. A photograph of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens, with the inset showing an enlarged portion of the phase-shifting surfaces layout. The device had a circular shape. The metal was copper, and appeared as light reddish brown. The dielectric shown exposed between the printed copper was Rogers RT/duroid 5880, and it was black.

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phase-shift range actually needed for a Fresnel lens. However, because the implemented phase-shift range was larger than 300, we will continue to call it a Fresnel lens rather than a quasi-Fresnel lens. Figure 13 shows a photograph of the phaseshifting-surface Fresnel lens. Details regarding its implementation can be found in [21]. The measured H-plane co-polarization far-field radiation patterns are presented in Figure 14 for the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna, the dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna (DPHLA), and the feed horn. Similar results were obtained for the E plane. Figure 14 clearly showed that the realized gain and beam shape were comparable for the two freestanding lensing devices. The realized gain was 30.1 dBi for the dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna, and 29.9 dBi for the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna. Figure 15 presents the realized gain as a function of frequency. The 1 dB gain bandwidth of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna was 8.2%. The gain of the two antennas was within 1 dB for a bandwidth of about 11%. The results from Figures 14 and 15 revealed that the electromagnetic performance of the dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna was only marginally better than that of the phaseshifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna. On the other hand, the cross-polarization levels in the E- and H-planes (not shown) was 43 dB below the maximum gain level for the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna, compared to 30 dB for the dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna [21]. Furthermore, the practical advantages of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens were undeniable: when compared to the conventional dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna, its weight was almost 10 times

Figure 15. The measured realized gains at the boresights of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna and the dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna (DPHLA): + thin phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna; O DPHLA; feed horn.

less, its thickness was about 40 times less, and its fabrication process was significantly simpler, which makes it a viable substitute for conventionally shaped lenses.

5.3 Phase-Correcting Fresnel-Zone-Plate Antenna

Using a symmetrical three-layer configuration as shown in Figure 1b, for which a3 = a1 , it was also possible to design polarization-independent free-standing lensing devices using the square elements shown in Figure 2a. In this case, a phasecorrecting Fresnel zone plate with 90 steps is presented. Its conductor pattern was designed using Equation (1) along with an algorithm to minimize the quantized phase for the desired 90 phase-correcting steps. A photograph is shown in Figure 16. The operation of the polarization-independent phaseshifting-surface phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate was comparable to an optimized equivalent dielectric-step phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate [33]. Their far-field co-polarized H-plane radiation patterns are shown in Figure 17, along with that of the feed horn. The patterns in the E plane were similar. The realized gain at boresight as a function of frequency is presented in Figure 18.

Figure 14. The H-plane co-polarization far-eld radiation patterns of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna and the dielectric plano-hyperbolic lens antenna (DPHLA), obtained from far-eld measurements at 30 GHz: + thin phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna; O DPHLA; Feed horn.
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The phase-shifting-surface phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate antenna with 90 phase steps outperformed the dielectricstep phase-correcting Fresnel-zone-plate antenna with 90 phase steps in almost every aspect. Its realized boresight gain of 29.9 dBi at 30 GHz was 1 dB higher. The 1 dB gain bandwidths were 9.7% and 5.9%, in favor of the dielectric-step
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Figure 16. A photograph of the polarization-independent phase-shifting-surface phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate. The device had a circular shape. The metal was copper and appeared as light reddish brown. The dielectric shown exposed between the printed copper was Rogers RT/ duroid 5880, and it was black.

Figure 17. The H-plane co-polarization far-eld radiation patterns of the phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate antennas obtained from far-eld measurements at 30 GHz: + thin phase-shifting surface design; O dielectric step design; feed horn.

Figure 18. The measured realized gains at the boresights of the phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate antennas: + thin phase-shifting-surface design; O dielectric step design; feed horn.

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a)

the co-polarization radiation pattern, which was in agreement with Figure 17. Figure 19b presents the cross-polarization radiation patterns, which revealed that the cross-polarization was higher in the diagonal planes. The highest cross-polarization level was 26.5 dB below the maximum gain, which was highly acceptable. Results presented in [19] also revealed that the polarization roll angle had a marginal effect on the realized boresight gain and cross-polarization level for the square-based phaseshifting-surface phase-correcting Fresnel-zone-plate antenna. Furthermore, the phase-shifting-surface design offers significant practical advantages: its weight is reduced by a factor of 5.5 and its thickness is 7.5 times less than its equivalent dielectric-step phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate. A strip-based design of the 90 phase-correcting Fresnelzone-plate antenna was also implemented [18, 21]. Because the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna of Section 5.2 had significantly better performance with no drawbacks compared to the 90 phase-correcting Fresnel-zone-plate antenna [21], we only briefly mention it here without an exhaustive description, although it is presented in Table 1. Nevertheless, we want to mention that its 1 dB gain bandwidth was 7.4%. The slightly larger bandwidth of the strip-based phase-shifting-surface 90 phase-correcting Fresnel-zone-plate antennas compared to the square-element phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate can be attributed to the fact that the strip geometry has a more even field distribution, as proposed in [34]. A comprehensive summary of the electrical and non-electrical characteristics of the high-gain lens antennas discussed or mentioned here is provided in Table 1 and Figure 20. Figure 20 contains three comparison charts that are similar to distance charts between cities, commonly used on road maps, in which each number represents a ratio (in dB or unitless). The device with the highest value is located directly above the number shown, and the device to which it is compared is located to the right of the number. For example, Figure 20a provides information about the gain difference in dB, where the bottom left number is 6.4, which means that the gain of the dielectricshaped lens, located on top of the number, is 6.4 dB higher than that of the Fresnel zone plate, located to the right of the number.

b)

Figure 19. The far elds of the phase-shifting-surface phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate antenna obtained from near-eld-to-far-eld transformation of near-eld probe measurements with 100 mm separation performed at 30 GHz: (a) co-polarization radiation pattern in dB, (b) cross-polarization radiation pattern in dB.

phase-correcting Fresnel-zone-plate antenna. The cross-polarization level in the E and H planes was 38 dB below the maximum gain level for the phase-shifting-surface phase-correcting Fresnel-zone-plate antenna, compared to 22 dB for the dielectric-step phase-correcting Fresnel-zone-plate antenna. For the phase-shifting-surface phase-correcting Fresnelzone-plate antenna, the cross-polarization level was also investigated outside the principal planes. Figure 19 presents far-field results obtained from near-field-to-far-field transformation of a near-field probe measurement. Figure 19a presents
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6. Proof of Concept of a Flat-Topped Beam Antenna Using the Phase- and AmplitudeShifting Surface (PASS)
The previous section showed that the phase-shifting-surface concept can be successfully applied for designing freestanding lensing devices requiring only phase correction. However, for the hybrid lens, presented in Section 5.1, this capability is shared with binary amplitude correction, each correction being performed in distinctive regions. The phase-shifting surface can be extended to allow for independent control of the phase and amplitude in the same
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a)

b) Figure 21. A photograph of the phase- and amplitudeshifting surface for generating a at-topped-beam antenna. The device had a circular shape. The metal was copper, and appeared as light reddish brown. The dielectric shown exposed between the printed copper was Rogers RT/ duroid 5880, and it was black.

region. We will call this a phase- and amplitude-shifting surface (PASS). This concept allows for a wider range of applications, such as beam shaping. Moreover, the phase- and amplitudeshifting surface allows for continuous amplitude correction, whereas the hybrid lens or Fresnel zone plate are limited to binary amplitude correction. c) To implement the phase- and amplitude-shifting surface, we used a four-layer configuration, as shown in Figure 1c. This configuration allowed for generating many combinations of phase shifting from 0 to 360, and of amplitude shifting from 0 dB to 12 dB [35]. The phase- and amplitude-shifting-surface concept was used for a flat-topped beam antenna application in which the main beam was flat from 20 to +20 . The required amplitude and phase at the phase- and amplitude-shifting surfaces aperture was obtained using the technique described in [36]. A photograph of the flat-topped beam phase- and amplitude-shifting surface is shown in Figure 21. A diameter of D = 153 mm and x = 0.2 mm were used. The feed horn used was located at a distance of 132 mm from the phase- and amplitude-shifting surface. The electric fields from the feed horn were locally modified by the phase- and amplitude-shifting surface in order that the far-field radiation pattern had a flattopped beam. Figure 22 shows the H-plane co-polarization farfield radiation patterns of the phase- and amplitude-shiftingsurface flat-topped beam antenna. Ripples in the main beam were more significant for the measured case, and the sidelobes were higher. In the E plane (not shown), the ripples in the main beam were less severe, and the sidelobe level was comparable. Investigations revealed that these discrepancies were mostly caused by the incidence angle and abrupt transitions within the conductive pattern [35]. These will be addressed in Section 7.
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Figure 20. Comparison charts among free-standing lensing devices presented or mentioned in this paper: (a) gain difference at 30 GHz (in dB), (b) ratio of weight (unitless), (c) ratio of thickness (unitless). The device with the highest value is located above for all three cases. The three-layer phase-shifting-surface designs included the polarizationdependent phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate from Section 5.2, the Fresnel lens from Section 5.3, and the polarization-independent phase-correcting Fresnel zone plate from Section 5.4.
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7. General Discussion
In this section, we address the main issues related to the current and future development of devices based on the phaseshifting-surface technology.

7.1 Bandwidth
The broadband nature of the phase-shifting surface is characterized by a low-pass behavior [22], similar to a low-pass filter, as shown in Figure 6. The preferred operation region is in the pass-band for maximum amplitude transmission, as required for efficient free-standing lensing devices. However, the preferred operation region is also close to the transition region, because the phase has a high sensitivity to physical dimensions ( ai ) in this region, therefore allowing for a larger phase-shift range. Because it operates close to the transition region, the phase-shifting surface as shown in the previous sections inherently has a limited bandwidth. Nevertheless, measurements confirmed phase-shifting-surface free-standing devices with 1 dB gain bandwidths in the range of 5% to 10%, and 3 dB gain bandwidths around 15% [18, 19, 21], which are more than acceptable for many applications. It is to be noted that using additional layers will translate into increasing the order of the phase-shifting surface, making the transition region narrower. This is not desired, as it will reduce the operational bandwidth. Consequently, the number of layers should be kept as small as possible, which is also good for maintaining a low manufacturing complexity for the structure. We showed that a two-layer phase-shifting surface covered about half a phase cycle, but it was still usable in some designs, as shown in Section 5.1. The designs using a three-layer phaseshifting surface appear to be a good compromise, as this surface covers nearly a full phase cycle, whereas a four-layer phaseshifting surface/phase- and amplitude-shifting surface can be used to obtain the flexibility in regards to amplitude and phase, as shown in Section 6. Some modifications to the geometry of the phase-shifting surface could be performed to improve the bandwidth. In [24], not only were conductive layers of capacitive patches used, but also conductive layers of inductive grids. Despite the fact that it requires more layers than the proposed phase-shifting-surface structures reported in this paper, this arrangement results in a bandpass configuration. We believe that the capacitive patches and conductive grids could be merged into the same conductive layers, resulting in a unit-cell configuration as shown in Figure 23. This would allow for a bandpass configuration, while maintaining the same number of layers. Preliminary investigations revealed the desired bandpass nature of such a configuration. More work is to be conducted to verify if such a geometry would allow for an acceptable phase-shift range.

Figure 22. The H-plane co-polarization normalized fareld radiation patterns of the phase- and amplitude-shifting-surface at-topped-beam antenna obtained at 30 GHz: + ideal (best t from specications); O calculated (best t using database); far-eld measurements.

Figure 23. A front view of the unit cell showing a patch-grid conguration. The dielectric is shown in gray, and the metal is shown as hatched.

7.2 Pattern Discontinuities

In the process of assessing the phase-shifting-surface technologies, we performed near-field measurements for some of the antennas presented in Section 5. Figure 24 shows the measured near fields of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens aperture presented in Section 5.2. They were obtained from planar near-field measurements, and back-projected to the output surface of the aperture. Figure 24b revealed that the phase was fairly constant over the entire aperture of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens, which was consistent for a gainmaximization design. On the other hand, Figure 24a did not present the monotonic amplitude roll-off that was expected over the aperture. By observing the physical metallized pattern of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens shown in Figure 13

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a)

are therefore akin to each other. Figure 24 shows that this may be a potential source of error when a phase-correcting cycle is repeated. Nevertheless, Section 5.2 showed that the far-field performance of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens antenna was more than acceptable, with performance similar to that of the dielectric plano-hyperbolic-lens antenna.

7.3 Frequency Range

Since the phase-shifting surface is designed to operate near the transition region, a phase-shifting-surface design is usually specifically tuned for a given operating frequency band. In other words, the given structure cannot be reused for another operating frequency band. Alternatively, it is possible to physically scale the structure for use at a different frequency band. The scaling is linearly performed on every physical dimension, and its ratio is proportional to the free-space-wavelength ratio between the new frequency and the initial design frequency. Consequently, designs at lower frequencies are bulkier, whereas designs at higher frequencies require enhanced etching capabilities or the use of alternative metallization technologies allowing for higher precision. At the present, we believe that this technology can be practically and realistically implemented at any frequency between 5 GHz and 100 GHz. With emerging nanotechnology fabrication techniques, the frequency range can potentially be increased to higher frequencies in the near future.

b)

7.4 Angle of Incidence

In the full-wave electromagnetic simulations of the phaseshifting surfaces unit cells, a normally incident plane wave was assumed. In a full design, we did assume normal incidence on the entire surface of the phase-shifting surface, similar to what was proposed in [1] for the design of reflectarrays and transmitarrays, although this is not strictly true. For most designs, the feed antenna is located close to the free-standing lensing device for practical purposes (small F D ), leading to an obliquely incident electromagnetic wave at the surface of the phase-shifting surface. In the central portion of the phaseshifting-surface free-standing lensing device, the angle of incidence is normal or close to normal, but away from the center the angle of incidence could be significantly high. For the prototypes with F D = 0.5 presented in Section 5, the angle of incidence at the perimeter of the phase-shifting surface was 45. Analyses were conducted for a symmetrical three-layer phase-shifting surface and different physical parameters ( ai ). Some results were summarized in [22]. In brief, the amplitude and phase were fairly constant for an incidence angle up to 30. It is possible to account for the angle of incidence, but at the price of an enormous database that would take a significant amount of time to generate. Furthermore, we believe that the improvements in performance would be marginal in many designs.

Figure 24. The back-projected near elds at the surface of the aperture of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens obtained from near-eld-probe measurement with 100 mm separation, performed at 30 GHz: (a) normalized amplitude in dB, (b) phase in degrees. The circumference of the aperture of the phase-shifting surface is shown as an overlaid dashed line in each case.

in conjunction with the near-field amplitude of Figure 24a, we found out that minima are present at locations where the metallized pattern of the phase-shifting-surface Fresnel lens changes abruptly (due to a change of cycle in the phase correction). It is thus believed that the amplitude discrepancies are caused by abrupt discontinuities between bare regions and high-metal-concentration regions. We therefore believe that the electromagnetic model described in Section 3, which assumes an infinite periodic structure, cannot realistically be locally applied for these cases. The technique presented in [1] thus seems to be limited for cases where the local cells vary gradually, and

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7.5 Practical Implementation

The phase-shifting surfaces presented in this paper were specifically tuned for a configuration in a free-space environment, without neighboring structures closely located. However, in a practical implementation situation, a radome may be desirable to protect the antenna and ensure long-term performance reliability. If a radome is placed right at the output surface of the phase-shifting surface, the performance of the phase-shifting-surface-based antenna will be compromised. Therefore, what needs to be done is to specifically tune the phase-shifting surface with the presence of the radome. We are currently working on such a configuration for a phase-shiftingsurface Fresnel lens. Preliminary results revealed that the electromagnetic performance should be comparable to that of a case without the radome, as presented in Section 5.2. Therefore, unlike some other types of antennas, the phase-shifting-surface technology allows for a simple means to compensate for the presence of a radome.

8. Conclusion
The phase-shifting-surface concept has been presented, along with prototypes using this technology. Their excellent electromagnetic performance and their sheer practicality make them very serious candidates for replacing existing conventional free-standing lensing devices. Moreover, their practical advantages make them potential alternatives to other types of existing antennas, which could result in an increase in deployment.

9. Acknowledgment
The authors would like to thank David Lee from the Communications Research Centre Canada for his work on this project.

7.6 Database Generation and Simulation Issues

Current unit-cell simulations were performed using commercially available software packages [30, 37]. Although extremely powerful, these software packages are not customized for simulating phase-shifting-surface problems. Consequently, the full-wave electromagnetic simulations are computer intensive and time consuming. If a parameter is to be changed in the phase-shifting surfaces configuration such as the thickness or dielectric constant the whole database will have to be re-simulated, which will take a significant amount of time. We are currently investigating ways to improve this aspect of our simulations by using a faster customized code, space-mapping techniques, or a combination of both.

10. References
1. J. Huang and J. A. Encinar, Reectarray Antennas, New York, Wiley-IEEE Press, 2007. 2. J. Shaker and R. Chaharmir, Microstrip Reflectarray Antennas, in D. Guha and Y. M. M. Antar (eds.), Microstrip and Printed Antennas: New Trends, Techniques and Applications, New York, John Wiley and Sons, 2011, Chapter 5. 3. F. G. Friedlander, A Dielectric Lens Aerial for Wide-Angle Beam-Scanning, Journal of the Institution of Electrical Engineers Part IIIA: Radiolocation, 93, 4, 1946, pp. 658-662. 4. W. E. Kock, Metal-Lens Antennas, Proceedings of the IRE, 34, 11, November 1946, pp. 828-838. 5. W. E. Kock, Metallic Delay Lenses, The Bell System Technical Journal, 27, January 1948, pp. 58-82. 6. S. B. Cohn, Artificial Dielectrics for Microwaves, Symposium on Modern Advances in Microwave Technique, November 1954, pp. 465-480. 7. D. Gabor, Holography, 1948-1971, Proceedings of the IEEE, 60, 6, June 1972, pp. 655-668. 8. W. E. Kock, Microwave Holography, Microwaves, 7, 11, November 1968, pp. 46-54. 9. B. R. Brown and A. W. Lohmann, Computer-Generated Binary Holograms, IBM Journal of Research and Development, 13, 2, March 1969, pp. 160-168. 10. G. Tricoles and E. L. Rope, Binary, Detour Phase, Microwave Holography, G-MTT International Microwave Symposium Digest, May 1970, pp. 124-125.

7.7 Other Potential Designs

Although not yet studied, the rectangular conductive element of Figure 2b has a high potential for realizing freestanding devices capable of providing polarization versatility or polarization transformation. Polarization transformation would allow for a 45-tilt linear polarization angle to produce an outgoing circular polarization, or vice versa. Polarization versatility would allow for a single phase-shifting-surface lensing device to have a given focal length in one plane and another focal length in the orthogonal plane. We are also considering the use of phase-shifting surfaces in other antenna designs. In particular, we believe the squareelement phase-shifting-surface technology is well suited for designing low-cost, lightweight antennas with beam-steering capabilities [38, 39].

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11. B. R. Brown and A. W. Lohmann, Complex Spatial Filtering with Binary Masks, Applied Optics, 5, 6, June 1966, pp. 967-969. 12. L. B. Lesem, P. M. Hirsch, and J. A. Jordan, The Kinoform: A New Wavefront Reconstruction Device, IBM Journal of Research and Development, 13, 2, March 1969, pp. 150-155. 13. D. T. McGrath, Planar Three-Dimensional Constrained Lens, IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, AP34, 1, January 1986, pp. 46-50. 14. D. M. Pozar, Flat Lens Antenna Concept Using Aperture Coupled Microstrip Patches, IEE Electronics Letters, 32, 23, November 1996, pp. 2109-2110. 15. C. Abella et al., Artificial Dielectric Lens Antennas: Assessment of their Potential for Space Applications, 23rd European Microwave Conference, September 1993, pp. 896898. 16. A. Petosa, A. Ittipiboon, and S. Thirakoune, Design and Performance of a Perforated Dielectric Fresnel Lens, IEE Proceedings on Microwaves, Antennas and Propagation, 150, 5, October 2003, pp. 309-314. 17. M. R. Chaharmir, A. Ittipiboon, and J. Shaker, Single-Band and Dual-Band Transmitarray, International Symposium on Antenna Technology and Applied Electromagnetics (ANTEM), July 2006, pp. 491-494. 18. N. Gagnon, A. Petosa, and D. A. McNamara, Comparison Between Conventional Lenses and an Electrically Thin Lens Made Using a Phase Shifting Surface (PSS) at Ka Band, Loughborough Antennas and Propagation Conference (LAPC), November 2009, pp. 117-120. 19. N. Gagnon, A. Petosa, and D. A. McNamara, Thin Microwave Phase-Shifting Surface (PSS) Lens Antenna Made of Square Elements, IET Electronics Letters, 46, 5, March 2010, pp. 327-329. 20. N. Gagnon, A. Petosa, and D. A. McNamara, Thin Microwave Quasi-Transparent Phase-Shifting Surface (PSS), IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, AP-58, 4, April 2010, pp. 1193-1201. 21. N. Gagnon, A. Petosa, and D. A. McNamara, PhaseCorrecting Lens Antennas Made Using a Three-Layer Phase Shifting Surface (PSS) at Ka Band, International Symposium on Antenna Technology and Applied Electromagnetics (ANTEM), July 2010. 22. N. Gagnon, A. Petosa, and D. A. McNamara, In-Depth Examination of a 3-Layer Phase Shifting Surface (PSS) and its Use in a Thin Fresnel Lens Design, IEEE AP-S Topical Conference on Antennas and Propagation in Wireless Communications (IEEE-APWC), September 2011, pp. 31-34.

23. N. Gagnon, A. Petosa, and D. A. McNamara, Hybrid Printed Lens Antenna, IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, AP-60, 5, May 2012, pp. 2514-2518. 24. M. Al-Joumayly and N. Behdad, Wideband Planar Microwave Lenses Using Sub-Wavelength Spatial Phase Shifters, IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, AP-59, 12, December 2011, pp. 4542-4552. 25. R. Shibayama, H. Deguchi, and M. Tsuji, Flat Thin Polarizer-Lens Based on Multiple Resonance Behavior, IEEE International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation, July 2010. 26. R. H. Phillion and M. Okoniewski, Lenses for Circular Polarization Using Planar Arrays of Rotated Passive Elements, IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, AP-59, 4, April 2011, pp.1217-1227. 27. C.-C. Cheng, B. Lakshminarayanan, and A. AbbaspourTamijani, A Programmable Lens-Array Antenna with Monolithically Integrated MEMS Switches, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, 57, 8, August 2009, pp.1874-1884. 28. P. Padilla, A. Muoz-Acevedo, M. Sierra-Castaer, and M. Sierra-Prez, Electronically Reconfigurable Transmitarray at Ku Band for Microwave Applications, IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, AP-58, 8, August 2010, pp. 25712579. 29. J. Y. Lau and S. V. Hum, A Planar Reconfigurable Aperture with Lens and Reflectarray Modes of Operation, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, 58, 12, December 2010, pp. 3547-3555. 30. IMST Empire XCcel, http://www.empire.de. 31. Agilent Technologies Advanced Design System (ADS), http://www.agilent.com/find/eesof-ads. 32. H. D. Hristov, Fresnel Zones in Wireless Links, Zone Plate Lenses and Antennas, Norwood, MA, Artech House, 2000. 33. A. Petosa, N. Gagnon, and A. Ittipiboon, Optimization of Dielectric Fresnel Lens Thickness for Maximizing Gain, International Symposium on Antenna Technology and Applied Electromagnetics (ANTEM), July 2006, pp. 519-522. 34. D. F. Sievenpiper, Artificial Impedance Surfaces for Antennas, in C. A. Balanis (ed.), Modern Antenna Handbook, New York, John Wiley and Sons, 2008, Chapter 15. 35. N. Gagnon, A. Petosa, and D. A. McNamara, Electrically Thin Free-Standing Phase and Amplitude Shifting Surface (PASS) for Beam Shaping Applications, Microwave and Optical Technology Letters, 54, 7, July 2012, pp. 1566-1571. 36. R. S. Elliott and G. J. Stern, Shaped Patterns from a Continuous Planar Aperture Distribution, IEE Proceedings H
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 Microwaves, Antennas and Propagation, 135, 6, December 1988, pp. 366-370. 37. Ansoft HFSS, http://www.ansoft.com/products/hf/hfss/. 38. H. D. Griffiths and M. R. Khan, Antenna Beam Steering Technique Using Dielectric Wedges, IEE Proceedings H Microwaves, Antennas and Propagation, 136, 2, April 1989, pp. 126-131. 39. Y. Yang, Analytic Solution of Free Space Optical Beam Steering Using Risley Prisms, Journal of Lightwave Technology, 26, 21, November 2008, pp. 3576-3583. Aldo Petosa received the BEng, MEng, and PhD in Electrical Engineering from Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada, in 1989, 1991, and 1995, respectively. From 1990 to 1994, he carried out research at CAL Corporation on microstrip antennas for cellular and mobile satellite communication applications. In 1995, he joined the Communications Research Centre Canada, Ottawa, Canada, where he is presently the Project Leader for Antenna Design and Development in the Advanced Antenna Technology Lab. He has published over 150 journal and conference papers, and is the author of the Dielectric Resonator Antenna Handbook (Artech House, 2007). His current research interests include microstrip antennas, microwave lenses, dielectric resonator antennas, reconfigurable antennas, and holographic techniques applied to antenna designs. Dr. Petosa is an Adjunct Professor with the Department of Electronics at Carleton University, and is currently the Canadian National Council Chair for URSI Commission B. He is also on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of RF and Microwave Computer-Aided Engineering, and is a member of the IEEE AP-S Industry Initiatives Committee. Dr. Petosa was a recipient of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society Commendation Certificate recognizing exceptional performance as a reviewer for the Transactions for 2008.

Introducing the Feature Article Authors

Nicolas Gagnon received the Bachelor of Applied Science (BASc) with the highest honors (summa cum laude) and the Master of Applied Science (MASc) degree, both in Electrical Engineering, from the University of Ottawa, Canada, in 2000 and 2002, respectively. He received the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2011, also from the University of Ottawa. Since 2001, he has been a Research Engineer in the Advanced Antenna Technology Lab at the Communications Research Centre Canada, Ottawa, Canada. His research interests include microwave lenses, quasi-optics, permittivity measurement, microwave holography, and microwave antennas. He has published 12 journal papers, 20 conference papers, and is co-inventor on a patent application on phase-shifting surfaces. He served as co-chair of the Students Award Committee at the ANTEM 2010 conference, and he was a member of the Technical Program Committee at the ANTEM 2006 and 2010 conferences. In 2009, he was awarded the Best Student Paper Prize at the Loughborough Antennas and Propagation Conference (LAPC). The same year, he received the Excellence in Technology Transfer Award from the Canadian Federal Partners in Technology Transfer (FPTT). He also received the Young Scientist Best Paper Award at the 2011 Joint International Conference on Electromagnetics in Advanced Applications (ICEAA) and IEEE-APS Topical Conference on Antennas and Propagation in Wireless Communications (IEEE-APWC) held in Torino, Italy. Dr. Gagnon is a licensed Professional Engineer in the province of Qubec, Canada, and a member of the Ordre des ingnieurs du Qubec.
IEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine, Vol. 55, No. 2, April 2013

Derek A. McNamara received the BSc with honors from the University of Cape Town (UCT) in 1976, the MSc from the Ohio State University in 1980, and the PhD from UCT in 1986, all in Electrical Engineering. During the periods 1977 to 1979 and 1981 to 1985, he was employed as a Senior Research Engineer at the Council for Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR), Pretoria, South Africa. He was a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering of the University of Pretoria from 1985 to 1994 (Grinaker Chair in Electromagnetics from 1991 to 1994), and in 1992 was a Visiting Scientist at the Institut fr Hchstfrequenztechnik und Elektronik (IHE) at the University of Karlsruhe, Germany. He was a Principal Member of Technical
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Staff with the COM DEV Space Group, Ontario, Canada from 1994 through 2000, where he worked on satellite antenna design and development. Since 2000, he has been a Professor of Electrical Engineering in the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), University of Ottawa, Canada. His research interests include antenna synthesis and design, computational electromagnetics, microwave circuits, and electromagnetic measurements. He has published 85 papers on these subjects in international journals, and 65 in conference proceedings. He is a coauthor of the text Introduction to the Uniform Geometrical Theory of Diffraction (Artech House, 1990). In 2008 he received the John V. Marsh Award for Excellence in Teaching from the University of Ottawa, and one of the Commemorative Research Medals from the University of Pretoria as part of its centennial celebrations. He was a Specialist Editor for Electromagnetics of Computer Physics Communications from 1990 to 2000, and is currently an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation. He is a Licensed Professional Engineer in the Province of Ontario, Canada.

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