Wireless Interconnect Between On-Chip and LTCC Antennas
In this work, a novel System-in-Package (SiP) implementation is presented for a transmitter (TX) module which makes use of electromagnetic coupling between the TX chip and package antennas at 5.2 GHz.
Overview
On-chip antennas though help in miniaturization but have very low efficiencies due to lossy silicon substrates. Alternately, off-chip antennas generally require bond wires, matching elements, buffer amplifiers etc. This project, for the first time, realized wireless interconnect between a transmitter chip with low-efficiency on-chip antenna to an efficient antenna on LTCC package. The transmitter with on-chip antenna feeds the LTCC patch antenna through aperture coupling, thus negating the need for any wires, transmission lines or other components. It increases the gain and range of the transmitter module manifolds with respect to the on-chip antenna alone. Though the range of the transmitter in LTCC package increases considerably, power consumption remains the same as that of the transmitter chip operating with on-chip antenna only.
The paper on this topic won the Overall Best Paper Award at EuWiT conference during the 2008 European Microwave Week in Amsterdam.
Further Information:
A. Shamim, M. Arsalan, L. Roy, "Wireless interconnect between on-chip and LTCC antennas for system-in-package applications," European Conference on Wireless Technology (EuWiT) in EuMA Week, pp.21-24, 27-28 Oct. 2008.
