2017 11th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EUCAP)

A TM0 Surface Wave Launcher by Microstrip and

Substrate Integrated Waveguide Technology
Victoria Gomez-Guillamon Buendia1 , Symon K. Podilchak1 , George Goussetis1 , Jose-Luis Gomez-Tornero2
1 (Heriot-WattUniversity): Institute of Sensors Signals and Systems, Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom
{ vg22, s.podilchak, g.goussetis } @hw.ac.uk
2 (Technical University of Cartagena): Department of Information and Communication Technologies, Cartagena, Spain

josel.gomez@upct.es

Abstract—In this summary article, a simple surface wave
launcher (SWL) in substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) technol-
ogy is proposed. The launcher utilizes a conventional microstrip
to SIW transition with the motivation of transferring power
into the dominant TM0 surface wave (SW) mode of a grounded
dielectric slab (GDS). Moreover, by appropriate design of the
SIW section and by applying field matching techniques using sub-
wavelength microstrip patches while also conveniently separating
some of the via conducting posts for one of the SIW side-walls,
power can leak into the GDS with minimal losses for the genera-
tion of a bound and guided TM SW with a uniform phase front.
The design approach is confirmed by numerical calculations
and full-wave simulations for two feed systems which operate
at 15 GHz, with and without the matching section. Our new
approach for simple, microstrip-fed SW launching at microwave
frequencies can also be useful for other SW-based guides, novel
low-cost transitions, and new compact dividing/combing circuits
for antenna feed systems as well as other SW structures which
employ a common substrate.
I. I NTRODUCTION
Substrate integrated waveguides (SIWs) are a well estab-
lished technology allowing for the implementation of a rectan-
gular waveguide in planar form. Thereby most SIW structures
can offer the advantages of being low-profile, compact, and
light weight. It is also a common planar technology for wave
guidance with low loss at microwave frequencies that can
also avoid metallic waveguide to planar transitions, which can
typically lead to narrower bandwidths and extra fabrication
costs [1]. SIW technology can be implemented in a dielectric
substrate with metalization at the top and the bottom with
two separated rows of vias (along the direction of wave prop-
agation to emulate the side walls of the metallic waveguide)
that are electrically connected to the top and bottom metalized
sections of the dielectric waveguide. Only the TEn0 modes can
be supported in SIW structures, this is because their surface
currents are the only ones which are not interrupted by the
vias, thus the mode can be preserved and bounded within
the structure given that no radiation is produced [2]. Many
applications for this technology have been recently proposed,
e.g. power dividers, filters, couplers or antennas [3]–[5].
One of the main and perhaps unwanted features of SIW
structures is the guides predisposition to generate leakage
losses into the periphery substrate because of the practical sep-
aration between the vias. These losses are normally negligible
except if the separation between the vias is longer than their
diameter. If this is the case leakage into the periphery parallel
plate sections can be obtained. More specifically, if the via
separation is wide enough, power can be coupled into the TEM
parallel-plate wavedguide (PPW) modes. This feature has also
been utilized in the design of a leaky-wave antenna (LWA) [6].
This kind of antenna has several advantages such as directive
beam patterns and typically a beam scan-angle that changes
with frequency [7]–[9]. Other works [10] have demonstrated
the possibility to independently control the leakage rate α and
the phase constant β for these antennas, getting an optimized
radiation efficiency for a given scanning angle and radiation
length.
Nevertheless, feeding planar LWAs in grounded dielectric
slab (GDS) at microwave and millimeter-wave frequencies can
be challenging in terms of design size and simplicity. Some
surface wave (SW) driven structures have also been recently
reported which exploit SWs for the transformation from a slow
guided wave to a fast, leaky-wave (LW) mode. As shown in
these studies, planar Yagi-Uda like slot arrangements in the
ground plane can couple power into the dominant TM0 SW
mode of GDS and cylindrical-waves can be observed with
radial propagation along the planar guiding surface [11]–[15].
These printed structures are also typically fed by coplanar
waveguide transmission lines, and this means that the launcher
system is typically implemented in the ground plane. This
might not be practically favored when a continuous metallic
backing is required for low profile positioning on an airplane
fuselage for example. Therefore, the motivation for our work
is to offer an alternative TM SW feed system with a 50-Ω
microstrip input transmission line while also employing SIW
technology for leakage into the GDS.
We design the proposed feed system for SW excitation,
with low losses, by following our previous work in [16] which
enabled PPW guidance. In particular, in [16] a T-junction with
width W and length L was designed such that one of the side
walls was modified by separating the vias at a distance P to
support the leakage of energy into the PPW for the generation
of a TEM plane-wave front. It should also be mentioned that
our design was single layer, more compact and simpler than
other coupling slot structures or windows as shown in previous
works for other parallel-plate feeding systems [17], [18].
By following these earlier developments and the work in

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 2017 11th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EUCAP)
z 50-Ω microstrip line into the TE10 mode in the SIW ensuring
Microstrip x Microstrip to
Input
y SIW transition
P Leaky SIW
W
T-Junction
L be applied for leakage into the PPW is that the phase constant
S
Matching
Section
D G
SW Section
Fig. 1. Proposed TM0 SWL feed system for grounded slab with a 50-Ω
microstrip input. It is composed of the microstrip transition, the leaky SIW
T-junction, and the sub-wavelength matching section for SWs.
[16], we offer an alternative SW feed system while using
a uni-planar substrate for low-cost fabrication. In particular,
we now include a simple parallel plate TEM mode to TM0
SW mode transition. Physically speaking, power leaked into
the TEM mode by the appropriate via separation is coupled
into the TM0 SW mode by truncating the parallel plate at
a fixed distance S while also including a simple matching
section which employs sub-wavelength patches. The structure
for this TM0 SWL is shown in Fig. 1. Moreover, the use of
coplanar waveguides in the ground plane for SW feeding, as
was done in [8], [11]–[13], may be avoided in our proposed
design since a microstrip transmission line for SIW feeding is
employed [19], also enabling low-cost design and single-layer
fabrication.
II. D ESIGN A PPROACH & R ESULTS
The proposed structure operates at 15 GHz, keeping stable
the SW phase front in a narrow bandwidth. This is due to
the design principles of the leaky SIW T-junction; i.e. if the
frequency is below 15 GHz the electric field gets narrower with
limited field penetration into the PPW and the SW regions. At
higher frequencies (above 15 GHz) two different wavefronts
are possible which diverge from the longitudinal symmetry
axis of the structure.
The design procedure for the structure can be divided in
three parts, the microstrip to SIW transition, the leaky SIW T-
junction, and the matching section. Also, the dielectric selected
for the structure is Rogers RT5880 with a relative permittivity
of 2.2 and a height of 1.575 mm.
The microstrip to SIW transition uses a microstrip line to
excite the TE10 SIW mode within the T-junction. This is based
on the use of a tapered microstrip line section that connects
the SIW structure with a 50-Ω microstrip transmission line.
This tapered section transform the quasi-TEM mode of the
Authorized licensed use limited to: University of Pisa. Downloaded 3860
field matching over a broad bandwidth [19]. In our design of
this transition, reflection coefficient values are below -17 dB
with -0.3 dB of insertion losses.
On the other hand, the leaky SIW T-junction is based on
[16], where the complex propagation number can be described
by k(x) = β(x) − jα(x). Thus the first condition that must
β must be higher than the leakage rate α. The launching
efficiency in this case is related to α: η = 1 − e−αL .
Furthermore, by following the steps for an independent control
of β and α as shown in [10], the leakage rate is set for a 90%
launching efficiency and it can be found that for a given leaky
guide length L that α = 2.3/L. Moreover, to achieve a plane-
wave with a uniform phase front within the PPW, the splitting
condition must be satisfied; i.e. β = α [9]. The calculations for
β and α can be made using the transverse resonance technique
as explained in [6] and [20]. Finally, the width W of the SIW
structure and the distance P between vias can be selected for
the values where the splitting condition is satisfied. Also, in
order to reduce reflections within the feed system, a little via
[21] has been placed in the centre of the T-junction as shown
in Fig. 1. The structure parameters were optimized for vias
with a 1 mm of diamater as follows, W = 7.8 mm, L = 50
mm, and P = 4.5 mm.
Once the leaky SIW T-junction was implemented as de-
scribed above, the transition between the TEM PPW mode to
the TM0 SW mode was made by first truncating the parallel
plate at a fixed distance S from the SIW conducting via
edge, in our case this distance was set to λ/2 to ensure a
gradual transition and comparison. This transition supports
the transfer of power from the TEM PPW mode into the
TM0 SW mode of the GDS. It should also be mentioned that
this structure offers unimodal behavior due to the high cutoff
frequencies for the higher modes which are 64.16 GHz in
the parallel plate and 43.47 GHz in the GDS. Nevertheless,
there is some mismatching between the phase constants of
Normalized Phase Constant
β/Ko
Parallel Plate TEM
GDS TMo
Frequency (GHz)
Fig. 2. Phase constant calculations for the parallel plate TEM mode and the
TM0 SW mode of GDS.
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 2017 11th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EUCAP)
S Parameters
Without Matching Section
With Matching Section
Magnitude (dB)
Frequency (GHz)
Fig. 3. Simulated reflection coefficient versus frequency with and without the
matching section for SW excitation. An improvement of 11 dB is obtained
for the matched design when compared to the unmatched design.
the PPW mode and the TM0 SW mode, as shown in Fig. 2.
This can cause some reflections and therefore the necessity of
a matching section which can be included next to the edge
of the parallel plate. In particular, in our case the parallel
plate is truncated a distance S of a λ/4 from the leaky
SIW T-junction for improved matching and general design
compactness. This matching section for SWs consists of a sub-
wavelength square array of metallic patches printed on the top
of the substrate. This section has mainly two parameters, the
distance D between patches and the gap G between them.
The surface grid impedance, Zg , generated by this structure
is based on the alteration of the gaps so that the guided wave
within this matching section can be more tailored to the TM0
SW mode of the GDS. In our structure the size of the matching
section is a quarter wave transformer, with a length of 10.05
mm, having a distance D between patches of 4.8 mm and a
gap G of 0.48 mm, the distance D is more than four times
smaller than the free-space wavelength so the sub-wavelength
condition is satisfied. These parameters may be found by
ηef f
using the following equations [22]: Zg = −j 2γ and γ =
κ1 D 1 [6] D. Deslandes and K. Wu, “Substrate integrated waveguide leaky-wave
π ln sin( πG )
where Zg is the surface grid impedance and
√ 2D
κ1 = κo εr and ηef f = µo /εo εef f with εef f = εr2+1 .
p
A comparison for the reflection coefficients versus fre-
quency of the structure with and without matching section
is depicted in Fig. 3. An improvement of 11 dB at the design
frequency is obtained; i.e. |S11 | < −17 dB at the 50-Ω
microstrip input. Moreover, in Fig. 4 the full-wave simulations
show the plane wave front for both cases with and without
the matching section. Propagation can be observed in both
cases within the PPW region as well as a uniform plane-wave
front. However, it should be highlighted that a guided-wave
is maintained after the matching section only, illustrating the
desired TM SW propagation.
III. C ONCLUSION
The proposed structure for TM0 surface wave (SW) plane
wave excitation, offers an alternative to Yagi-Uda like slot
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Fig. 4. Full-wave CST simulations of the electric field within the middle of
the slab without (left) and with the matching section (right).
arrangements in the ground plane which can couple power
into the dominant TM0 SW mode of a grounded dielectric
slab (GDS). For simple fabrication and uni-planar operation
our newly proposed planar surface-wave launcher (SWL)
utilizes a conventional microstrip to SIW transition, a leaky
substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) T-junction, and a sub-
wavelength matching section defined by printed patches. Full-
wave simulations confirm operation of the feed system and
reduced reflections are observed; i.e. |S11 | is about -20 dB.
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