19 May I998

0 IEE 1998
Electronics Letters Online No: 19980845
Y. Hu (LEPSI, IN2P3/CNRS, Universita Louis Pasteur, BP 20, 23 rue
du Loess, 67037 Strasbourg Cedex, France)

References
SANSEN, w.M.c., and CHANG, z.: 'Limits of low noise performance of
detector readout front ends in CMOS technology', ZEEE Trans.
Circuits Syst., 1990, CAS-37, (1 l), pp. 1375-1382
2 TEDJA, s., VAN DER SPJEGEL, J., and WILLIAMS, H H.: 'A CMOS lownoise and low-power charge sampling integrated circuit for
capacitive detectorhensor interfaces', ZEEE J. Solid-state Circuits,
1995, SSC-30, (2), pp. 110-1 19

3
-1

t4

100

200

300

-9

time, s (x10 )

Fig. 2 Simulated transient response

0output voltage, V

ANCHINOLFI, F., ASPELL, P., CAMPBELL, M., HEIJNE, E H . , JARRON, P ,

MEDDELER, G , and SANTIARD, J c.: 'ICON, a current mode

preamplifier in CMOS technology for use with high rate particle

detectors', IEEE Trans. Nucl. Sci., 1993, NS-40, (3), pp. 271-274
4 WULLEMAN, J.: 'Current mode charge pulse amplifier in CMOS
technology for use with particle detectors', Electron. Lett., 1996,
32, (6), pp. 515-516
5 KRUMMENACHER, F.: 'Pixel detcctors with local intelligence: an IC
designer point of view', Nucl. Instrum. Methods Phys. Res., 1991,
A305, pp. 521-532

Annular slot-coupled dielectric resonator

antenna
K.W. Leung, W.C. Wong, 1K.M. Luk and E.K.N. Yung
An annular slot-coupled dielectric resonator antenna is
investigated experimentally. As compared with the previous
rectangular-slot version, the new configuration offers a much
wider bandwidth of 18%).The return loss, radiation patterns, and
antenna gain of the configuration have been measured and are
discussed.

frequency, Hi!

Fig. 3 Output noise spectral density, SJf)

Simulation results: To investigate the feasibility of the low noise

charge preamplifer discussed above, a simulation has been performed with Cadence 4.3.3 using the SPICE MODEL parameters
of the Process DMILL (Durci-Mixte sur Isolant Logico-Lineaire)
developed by CEA, France. The main design parameters and characteristics of the amplifier are summarised in Table 1. The simulated transient response is presented in Fig. 2 for an input current
pulse corresponding to 24000 electrons (3.84fC). From this Figure,
a conversion gain (charge-to-voltage gain) of 2.86mVifC and a rise
time of Ions have been obtained. The output noise spectral density S,,(f) of the amplifier is shown in Fig. 3. Total RMS output
noise voltage V,,oiu, can be calculated by
(4)
where Aj'is the amplifier noise bandwidth. The typical value for a
detector capacitance of lOpF and a DC leakage current of 5 p A is
0.58mV. Considering the conversion gain of 2.86mVifC taken
from Fig. 2, an input equivalent noise charge of 1265 electrons has
been obtained. The DC leakage current can be compensated up to
8 pA without deterioration of the low noise charge preamplifier
performance.

Conclusions: In this Letter, a high performance charge preamplifier with DC coupling to silicon detectors is presented. The advantage of this amplifier is its low noise level, high speed and high
gain with very low power consumption. More important, this
amplifier can be connected directly to silicon detectors due to its
high DC leakage current compensation and can be widely used in
particle physics and X-ray detection.

ELECTRONlCS LETTERS

25th June 1998

Vol. 34

Introduction: In the last decade, the dielectric resonator antenna

(DRA) [I] has been studied by a number of researchers [2 - 81 due
to its inherent merits of small size, low cost, low loss, and ease of
excitation. Among the various excitation methods for the DRA [I
- 61, the most popular is aperture coupling [4] as it avoids direct
contact between the DRA and the microstrip feedline. Moreover,
it enables the integration of DIL4 with a monolithic microwave
integrated circuit (MMIC), and, on the other hand, offers good
isolation between them. Recently, Chen et al. [6] have investigated
the use of an inclined slot to excite the DRA, and, as usual, the
slot is of rectangular shape. Little or no information on using an
annular slot for DRA excitation is available in the literature. The
annular slot excitation method is of interest because it is potentially suitable for easy excitation of circularly polarised fields. This
can be done, for example, by adding a 90" displaced microstrip
feedline with 90" phase difference. In this Letter, the annular slotcoupled DRA is investigated experimentally. As a preimlinary
study, we will consider only a single microstrip feedline, thus exciting linearly polarised fields. A cylindrical DRA, excited at the
broadside TM,,, mode [I], is used to demonstrate the new excitation scheme. It is found that the new configuration offers an
impedance bandwidth as wide as 18%, which is much higher than
slot width W

-,---.

+ '

cylindrica! DRA

,+

/ /
dielectric substrate
W f i i-

microstrip feedline
@

Fig. 1 Configuration of annular slot-coupled cylindrical D R A

No. 13

1275

high-permittivity dielectric disk [SI, the bandwidth can be further

increased.
Fig. 3 shows the measured return loss for different stub lengths
L, = 5.2, 6.4, 7.8, and 8.9".
In this case, the slot radius and the
slot width were kept constant at r = 4mm and W = 0.8mm,
respectively. With reference to the Figure, the stub length can be
used to vary the impedance level in addition to the slot size.

the conventional value of 8-12% (dielectric constant E, = 10). The

return loss, radiation pattern, and antenna gain were measured
and are discussed. Moreover, the effects of slot radius and of stub
length on the return loss are studied. As shown later, these two
parameters can be used to acheve impedance matching.
Antenna con$guration: The configuration of the annular slot-coupled cylindrical DRA is shown in Fig. 1, where the microstrip line
is of width W, and stub length L,.The DRA has radius a, height
h, and dielectric constant E,,, whereas the grounded dielectric slab
has dielectric constant E, and thickness d. The annular slot has
radius r and width W, whose centre coincides with that of the

DRA.
Resonant frequency: The TM,,,-mode resonant frequency of a
cylindrical DRA was given in [7]:

+0.15'78(57]
2h

(I)

cross-polarised

-do

*bo

'-160 ' 0 ' IO0 ' P O b a , , , -100 ' 0 ' IO0 '
observation angle,deg
observation angle,deg
a
b

where c is the speed of light in vacuum.

1762141
Fig. 4Measured radiation patterns at different frequencies
a H-plane
b E-plane
- f = 4.9GHz
f = 5.3GHz
f = 5.8GHz

~4 ~

~
~5 "
~
frequency,GHz

~6

"" ' 1 ~7

m:

Fig. 2 Measured return loss against frequency for different slot radii r
.
.....-. r = 3.0"
_ _ _ - r = 3.6"
r = 4.0"

Fig. 4a and b show the measured H- and E-plane radiation patterns,

respectively,
= 4mm,
"
~
~
~ forf=
"
~ 4.9,
~ 5.3,
~ and
" 5.8GHz,
~
~ with
~ r"
~
~W ~
= 0.8mm, and L,= 8.9".
The broadside patterns are obtained
as expected. Moreover, the fiied patterns are very similar over the
broad impedance bandwidth. At the broadside direction (e = O"),
the crosspolarised fields are at least 15dB lower than the copolarised fields. The field patterns were also measured at two other inband frequencies of 5.1 and 5.6GHz and similar results were
obtained.
The antenna gain of the configuration with r = 4mm, W =
0.8mm, and L, = 8.9"
was measured. A maximum gain of
5.9dBi was obtained at f = 5.35GHz. The result was similar to
that of the previous case [8] and is omitted here for brevity.
Acknowledgments: The authors would like to thank C.E. Tong

whose comments have initialised the work. This project is supported by the RGC Competitive Earmarked Research Grants
9040209 and 9040165.

-401

0 IEE 1998
Electronics Letters Online No: 19980776

6 April 1998

K.W. Leung, W.C. Wong, K.M. Luk and E.K.N. Yung (Department
of Electronic Engineering, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon,
Hong Kong)

References

Results: A cylindrical DRA of a = 7mm, h = 10.8",

and E,, =
9.5 was measured using an HP8510C network analyser (the DRA
in [8] is used again for comparison with the previous rectangularslot coupling). The thickness and dielectric constant of the substrate are d = 1.57 mm and E,~ = 2.33, respectively, and thus the
width of the microstrip line is W, = 4.66"
for a 50Q system.
Fig. 2 shows the measured return loss against frequency for different slot radii r = 3.0, 3.6, and 4.0".
The slot width and stub
length were kept constant at W = 0.8mm and L,= 8.9mm, respectively. With reference to the Figure, the impedance matching can
be achieved by changing the slot radius. At r = 4mm, an excellent
match is obtained at a resonant frequency (min. ISI1l)o f f =
5.21GHz. The resonant frequency agrees very well with the predicted value of 5.25GHz using eqn. 1. Note that the impedance
bandwidth (lSlll< -10dB) is now 18%, which is 2.3 times higher
than that of the rectangular-slot version (8% as found in [SI). It is
worth mentioning that by loading the DRA with a low-profile
1276

LONG, s.A., MCALLISTER, M w., and SHEN, L.C : 'The resonant

cylindrical dielectric cavity antenna', IEEE Trans., 1983, AP-31,
pp. 406-412
2 KRANENBURG, R.A., and LONG, S.A.: 'Microstrip transmission line

excitation of dielectric resonator antennas', Electron. Lett., 1988,

24, pp. 1156-1157

3

KRANENBURG, R.A.,
LONG, s.A.,
and WILLIAMS, J.T : 'Coplanar
waveguide excitation of dielectric resonator antennas', ZEEE
Trans., 1991, AP-39, pp. 119-122
4 ST MARTIN, J.T.H., ANTAR, Y.M.M , KISHK, A.A., and ITTIPIBOON, A.:
'Dielectric resonator antenna using aperture coupling', Electron.
Lett., 1990, 26, pp. 2015-2016
5 LEUNG, K.W., CHOW, K.Y., LUK, K.M., and YUNG, E.K.N.:'Excitation O f
dielectric resonator antenna using a soldered-through probe',
Electron. Lett., 1997, 33, pp. 349-350
6 CHEN, N.c., WONG, K.L., and LEUNG, K.w.: 'Input impedance of

inclined printed slot antennas and inclined-slot-coupled dielectric

resonator antennas', Microw. and Opt. Techn. Lett., 1996, 12, pp.
47-50

ELECTRONICS LETTERS

25th June 7998

Vol. 34

No. 13

"

KISLIK, AA, ITTIPIBOON, A., ANTAR, Y.M.M., and CUHACI, M.: 'Slot
excitation of the dielectric disk radiator', IEEE Trans., 1995, AP43, pp. 198-201
LEUNG, K.w., LUK, K.M., CHOW, K.Y., and YUNG, E.K.N.: 'Bandwidth
enhancement of dielectric resonator antenna by loading a lowprofile dielectric disk of very high permittivity', Electron. Lett.,
1997,33,pp. 725-726

Circularly polarised equilateral-triangular

microstrip antenna with truncated tip
Chia-Luan Tang, Jui-Han Lu and Kin-Lu W o n g
A novel circular polarisation (CP) design of a single-feed
equilateral-triangularmicrostrip antenna with a truncated tip is
proposed and experimentally studied. It is found that, when the
side length of the truncated tip is -0.09 times that of the

tip perturbation, the effective excited patch surface current path in

the y direction is slightly shorter than that in the x direction,
which gives the j-directed resonant mode a resonant frequency
slightly larger than that of the i-directed resonant mode. That is,
the dominant mode (TM,, mode) of the triangular patch can be
split into two near-degenerate orthogonal resonant modes of equal
amplitudes and 90" phase difference for CP operation. In addition, the single probe feed for CP operation can be determined
from the intersection of L, and L,, which are, respectively, the
50fi feed-position loci of the two excited orthogonal resonant
modes. These two feed-position loci are determined experimentally
in this study. For the probe feed at point A, which is usually
located in the right half of the triangular patch, right-hand CP
radiation with a good matching condition can be obtained. Conversely, left-hand CP radiation can be obtained by exciting the
patch at point B (the mirror image of point A with respect to the
centreline of the triangular patch).

triangular patch, circularly polarised radiation can be achieved by

using a single probe feed. Details of the antenna design are
described, and experimental results of the CP performance are

presented and analysed.

Introduction: Recently, owing to their relatively compact antenna

size at a fKed operating frequency, several designs of triangular
microstrip antennas for circular polarisation have been reported
[I, 21. These related designs include the use of a nearly equilateraltriangular patch [I] and an equilateral-triangularpatch with a slit
[2]. For the former design, the aspect ratio of the triangular patch
is required to be slightly different from 1.0 to allow the excitation
of two near-degenerate orthogonal modes for CP radiation. This
design, like the nearly-square and nearly-circular patches [3], is
very sensitive to aspect-ratio variation, and extreme care is usually
required in the design and fabrication processes. For the CP
design using an equilateral-triangular patch with a slit [2], the
antenna structure is simpler and shows relaxed manufacturing tolerances. However, regarding the capability of post-fabrication tuning for compensating fabrication errors or substrate material
tolerances [4], such a design method is limitated because it is
inconvenient to fine-tune the dimensions of the embedded slit
inside the triangular patch. In this Letter we demonstrate a novel
and simple design method for an equilateral-triangularmicrostrip
antenna to perform CP radiation, with simple post-fabrication
fine-tuning. The CP radiation of the proposed design is achieved
simply by cutting the correct sized section from the tip of an equilateral-triangularpatch (see Fig. 1). Typical designs have been successfully implemented, and experimental results of the CP
performance are presented and discussed.

@@

Fig. 2 Measured input impedancefor proposed antennas with E, = 4.4, h

= 1.6 mm, feed at point A
a Antenna 1: d = 56.0mm, Ad = 4.5mm, (xp,y,,) = (-7.3mm, -16.8mm)
b Antenna 2: d = 48.0mm, Ad = 4.2mm, (x,, y,) = (-7.2mm, -13.6mm)
c Antenna 3: d = 40.0mm, Ad = 3.6mm, (x,,,y,,) = (-3.8mm, -12.2")
I

0
1690

1700

1710 1720 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

frequency, MHz
a

frequency, MHz
b

2360 2370 2380 2390 2400

frequency, MHz
C

m
Fig. 1 Geometry of single-feed equilateral-triangularmicrostrip antenna
with truncated tip for CP operation
Feeds at point A and point B, respectively, are for right-hand and

left-hand CP operations

Antenna design and experimental results: Fig. 1 shows the proposed antenna design. The equilateral-triangularpatch has a side
length of d and is printed on a substrate of thickness h and relative
permittivity E,. A small triangular tip of side length Ad is truncated
in the triangular patch. It is expected that, owing to the truncated-

ELECTRONICS LETTERS

25th June 1998

Vol. 34

Pig. 3 Measured axial ratio et boresight direction for proposed antennas shown in Fig. 2
a Antenna 1
b Antenna 2
c Antenna 3

The proposed antenna has been constructed and measured. Fig.

2 shows typical results of the measured input impedance. Three
cases of different triangular patch dimensions are shown, with the
feed at point A for right-hand CP radiation. The measured results
of the axial ratio are presented in Fig. 3. The corresponding CP
performance is also given in Table 1. It is found that, when the
side length of the truncated tip is adjusted to be -0.09 times that

No. 13

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