Technical Education Webinar Series

Title: High Performance Ultra Compact Power Combiners for mmWave Systems

Date: October 10, 2023

Time: 8am PT / 11am ET

Sponsored by: RFMW and Nuvotronics

Presented by: Bill Rhyne, Product Line Director, Component Products, Nuvotronics

Abstract:
The market has adopted GaN-SiC HEMT transistors and MMICs for modern radar, electronic warfare (EW) and telecommunication systems. The adoption has eroded tube-based amplifiers (such as traveling wave tubes (TWTA’s) with GaN-SiC HEMT based solid-state amplifiers (SSPAs). This adoption has largely happened for narrowband applications at frequencies from C band and below. The application areas of “ultra-broadband” and “milli-meter wave (mmW)” require new approaches to allow for more efficient and footprint viable SSPA’s to challenge TWTAs.

Current approaches would deploy power combiners using either waveguide or printed circuit board (e.g. microstrip). Waveguide based systems offer high performance but are challenging to integrate with MMIC power amplifiers and have large footprints. We present PolyStrata^® technology which offers a unique three-dimensional additive manufacturing approach to building mmWave and ultrabroadband systems and components. We will share the basics of this technology and show how it can be applied to designing high performance power combiners for narrowband and wideband applications. We will show how this technology enables near waveguide insertion loss performance in an easy to integrate form factor. Power handling will be explained along with examples of integration with the MMIC amplifier circuitry. This technology scales to support high volume applications and is developed and produced in the United States, making it suitable for commercial and defense applications.

Presenter Bio:

Dr. Bill Rhyne is a Product Line Director of Component Products at Nuvotronics. At Nuvotronics he is commercializing PolyStrata^® technology for new space applications, 5G and 6G applications, advanced mmWave packaging, mmWave radar, and EW applications among others. He has a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from North Carolina State University and has worked at Texas Instruments, Motorola, Laird Technologies, and RFMD (now Qorvo). His previous work has included phased array radar systems, optoelectronics, RF and microwave semiconductors, multi-chip modules, and electronic materials.

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