A 60 GHz system-on-package balanced antipodal Vivaldi antenna with stepped dielectric director (BAVA-SDD) in LTCC

To improve the performance of Vivaldi antennas, a novel stepped dielectric director (SDD) is designed. Compared to the same antenna without an SDD, the new antenna has higher gain. The SDD is added to a balanced antipodal Vivaldi antenna (BAVA) to form a BAVA-SDD with dimensions of 12.4 × 4.2 × 0.776 mm³, which can be easily implemented in multilayered substrate technology. The director is created by extending the substrate of the existing antenna and using cavities to create a stepped profile. No further post-processing is required and a bandwidth limiting balun is unnecessary. Low temperature co-fired ceramic technology (LTCC) is used to implement the antenna and make it possible to integrate with other transceiver components to create a system-on-package solution (SoP). The BAVA-SDD displays a broad impedance bandwidth centered around 60 GHz and maintains a stable gain in this range. Measured results are in good agreement with simulations and indicate an insertion loss below -10 dB from 57 to 63 GHz and a boresight gain of 10.25 dBi at the center frequency of 60 GHz. To our best knowledge, this is believed to be the highest gain single element LTCC antenna reported at 60 GHz.