ElectroScience Laboratory

The ElectroScience Laboratory (ESL) at The Ohio State University (OSU) is a premier university center in the College of Engineering devoted to world-class electromagnetic scattering, antennas, propagation, remote sensing, wireless, signal processing, sensor fusion, THz, and photonics research areas.

ESL was established in 1942 and is one of the oldest and largest Radio Frequency (RF) /Optics laboratories in the United States. The center is comprised of 30 faculty and researchers, 10 administrative staff, 89 graduate students, and 17 undergraduate students. Every summer several undergrads are also recruited from diverse backgrounds to gain research experience.

ESL is housed in 2 buildings at the OSU Columbus campus: 20,000 ft2 70-year old building and 40,000 ft2 building that was occupied in April 2011.

Our faculty, research scientists, and students are involved in all aspects of electromagnetic and RF technologies, including:

Facilities

• Antenna engineering • Bio-nanotechnology and nano-imprinting • Bio-Optics • Computational methods and design • Electromagnetic compatibility and interference • Ground penetrating radar systems • Measurements Techniques • Micro-device modeling • Micro-electro-mechanical Systems (MEMS) • Multi-physics engineering • Packaging and interconnect design • Photonics • Propagation and radar scattering • Radar imaging • Remote sensing • RF integrated circuits (RFICs) and systems • RF materials & characterization • Satellite and ultra-wide-band width communications • Sensor fusion • Signal processing • THz Imaging & spectroscopy

●

www.electroscience.osu.edu

The ElectroScience Laboratory with total footage of 60,000 ft2

largest anechoic chamber of size 60’x40’x20’ and the

finest compact range in the world

The Laboratory houses the largest academic chamber of size 60’x40’x20’ and the finest compact range in the world, operating from 400 MHz up to 100 GHz. It has sensitivity down to –100 dBm and can measure antenna patterns with 100 dB dynamic range. In addition, OSU-ESL houses the following measurement facilities:

1. Several RF/Microwave vector analyzers from 10MHz up to 110GHz,

2. Extensive computational tools, both in-house developed, and commercial for large scale modeling of antennas, arrays and complex scattering scenes,

3. Polymer manufacturing and printing capability--this novel printing procedure allows for printing on flexible substrates for 3D integrated microwave designs,

4. Low-temperature co-fired ceramics (LTCC) fabrication and screen printing facility, including 3D inkjet printing and a direct-caster for low-loss 3D ceramic structures,

5. RFID Lab focusing on retail and warehouse inventory, pallet tracking and power harvesting technologies,

6. Remote sensing Lab with specialized equipment for L-band and C-band Radiometer and a 37 channel, 2 to 18 GHz radiometer,

7. Integrated Optics Lab for fabrication, test, and measurement of planar lightwave circuits,

8. Integrated wireless communication systems Lab with mixers, spectrum and vector analyzers for wireless devices/chips and RF integrated circuits,

9. PCB prototyping facility for manufacturing RF board designs-board plotter is capable of resolutions down to 0.25 μm (0.01 mils) using a 62,000 rpm drill,

10. Outdoors facility dedicated to automotive RF measurements for antennas and EMI/EMC,

11. MIMO radar lab demonstrating a 2x2 transceiver capable of 1 GSPS speed,

12. Terahertz laboratory for imaging spectroscopy, devices & method characterization from 60GHz up to 3THz.

Below we discuss in detail some of the facilities within the ElectroScience Laboratory.

Compact Range The compact radar range at the ESL is a state-of-the-art system

which can measure the radar scattering characteristics of objects as large as eight feet long or as small as a straight pin, obtaining complex radar signatures versus polarization, frequency, and target look angle for both non-cooperative target recognition studies and RCS control studies.

RF/Microwave Facility

I) RF Design and Characterization The ESL has a complete set of RF test and simulation

capabilities including • Hewlett-Packard 8510B and 8753C network analyzer,

300KHz-18GHz • Agilent 8722ET, 50MHz-40GHz • Agilent N5250A PNA mmW Network Analyzer, 10MHz to

110GHz • AGILENT E8362B , 10MHz - 20GHz • Agilent N5242A PNA-X performance analyzer 10MHz to

26GHZ • Agilent ESA-E spectrum analyzer, 9kHz - 26.5GHz • Anritsu 68369 A/NV signal generator, 10MHz - 40GHz • Agilent E4991A RF impedance analyzer, 1MHz - 3GHz • Tektronix AWG 2041 arbitrary waveform generator, 250

MS/s clock rate provides up to 125 MHz waveforms) • RF/Microwave Computer Aided Design from Agilent, Series

IV, and Advance Design System (ADS)

Compact Range

RF/Microwave Facility

II) Wireless Communication and millimeter-Wave Laboratory

This laboratory contains wide variety of measurement and testing equipment for characterizations up to 110GHz. Among the equipment are:

• Agilent E5053A Signal Source Analyzer with harmonic mixers (11970V) for operation up to 110 GHz

• Agilent E5052B Signal Source Analyzer, SSA with mixers for up to 50-75 GHz

• Spectrum Analyzer 50GHz+ mm head for up to 50-75GHz • Agilent E8257D-567 RF/LO source for LNAs, Mixers, PGA, up

to 67GHz • Agilent N8975AZ-K63 Noise Source Generator for up to 50-

63GHz • Agilent 89650S Wideband Vector Signal Analyzer+Spectrum

Analyzer+Phase noise (3Hz to 26.5GHz, 80 MHZ bandwidth digitizer 3G, 802.16 OFDM, WLAN).

• Agilent E8267D PSG analog signal generator, 250 kHz to 40GHz, AM, FM, phase modulation

• Agilent E8267D PSG vector signal generator, 250 KHz to 40 GHz, 6 GB Internal Hard drive, Internal baseband generator, 64 MSa memory, AM, FM, phase modulation and LF output

• Agilent E4448A Spectrum Analyzer PSA with mmW head (11970V) for up to 75GHz

• Agilent E8257D-567 Signal Generator PSG with E8257DS10 mm source for up to 110 GHz operation

• Agilent MXA N9020A-526 Signal Analyzer PSG with N8975AZ-K75 Block down convert and 346C-K01 Noise source

• Cascade 4-head probe station for up to 60GHz characterization

• Cascade 2-head probe station for up to 110GHz characterization

The above equipment can be used for mmWave and wireless chip evaluations, active load-pull measurements, testing of bluetooth V2.0 enhanced data rate chip, and integrated inductors.

Textile Antennas and Electronics Lab This lab hosts a high-end home-style Brother® embroidery

machine for prototyping the e-fiber textile antennas and electronics. The machine has a maximum embroidery speed of 1050 stitches per minute (spm), and a USB port for conveniently importing textile patterns. More important, it allows for automatic embroidery. In addition, the lab also has a casting device for making uniform polymer substrates. Assembly of the e-fiber textiles and polymer substrates is also carried out in this lab.

Wireless Communication and mmW Lab

Textile Antennas & Electronics Lab

Ceramics Fabrication Facility

This facility was made possible through a 2006 DURIP award from Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR). The facility includes equipment that enables investigations involving the vertical integration of wireless and optical technology. The equipment includes:

• Milling machine from T-Tech, model# QC-HF • Screen printer from Affiliated Manufacturers, Inc., model#MSP-

485 • Laminator from Pacific Trienetics Corporation, model# IL-4000 8 • Collating Tool from Pacific Trinetics Corporation • Furnace from Applied Test Systems • Dicing Saw from Aremco, model#5255 • 3D ink jet printer for ceramic processing from Xaar & Vivid • Robocaster for ceramic processing, from 3D Inks • Atmosphere and rate-controlled drying furnace from ATS • Atmosphere-controlled hot press from Instron

Distributed-Memory Parallel Supercomputer and Software

Our close collaboration with the Ohio Supercomputer Center (OSC) puts several industrial-scale supercomputers at our disposal for extremely large-scale electromagnetics simulation, but that’s only part of the story. The ElectroScience Lab also hosts Cadence Design Environment, and, an in-house 7-node supercomputer consisting of 28 Quad Core Xeon processors, 480 GB of memory, on an Infiniband™ Switched-Fabric Network topology.

Our efforts were recently rewarded with a generous donation form Intel of sixteen 10-Core Xeon processors, all of which were turned into two 40-Core Xeon Stand-Alone Servers and four smaller 20-Core systems for use by our members.

It’s our relationships with business and others on campus which allow us to provide our students access to packages such as HFSS, Cadence, Comsol, FEKO, ADS, CST MicroWave Studio, AutoCAD, Matlab, Allegro, LabView, ModelSIM, L-Edit, and the full suite of Intel Compilers.

Integrated Optics Lab The Integrated Optics Lab at ESL enables in-house fabrication, test,

and measurement of planar lightwave circuits. Equipment includes continuous wave tunable laser at telecommunication wavelengths, InGaAs photo detectors, numerical simulation tools and data acquisition software, floating optical tables, optical components such as quarter waveplates, half waveplates, polarizers, single mode and polarization maintaining optical fiber, fiber polarization control, translation stages, XYZ stages for high precision sample positioning, digital-video measurement inspection unit for optical micrographs and optical alignment to integrated optics.

Ceramics Fabrication Facility

Automotive Measurements Facility

The ESL has a dedicated automotive measurement facility complete with an outdoor automotive turntable for performing automated antenna radiation measurements from actual antennas on platforms. In recent research projects this facility has been used to design new automotive antennas that are already being incorporated into production vehicles. Future research to be performed at ESL’s automotive measurements facility involves wide-band and antennas hidden within the automobile body, as well as EM coupling and interference studies involving various vehicle systems.

PCB Prototyping Facility Automated PCB prototyping capability provides the

ElectroScience Laboratory researchers and students same day turnaround for the manufacturing RF board designs. The state-of-the-art circuit board plotter is capable of resolutions as fine as 0.25 μm (0.01mils) using a 62,000 rpm drill. The vacuum tabletop holds the work pieces tightly against the work surface, eliminating substrate irregularities. An integrated fiducial recognition camera can be used to align boards for double or multilayer production in a quick and accurate way.

Radar and Remote Sensing Lab The ESL has an advanced Remote Sensing Lab with specialized

equipment that was developed by the Remote Sensing Group including an L-band Interference Suppressing Radiometer and a C-band Interference Suppressing Radiometer. In addition, the lab has a 37-channel radiometer covering 2 to 18 GHz.

Software Defined Radios/Radars OSU-ESL has recently developed significant expertise and

laboratory focused on software defined radio and radars. The goal is to integrate RF front ends with Digital electronics to produce multifunctional “software defined” multichannel receivers. So far, 2x2 software defined radar has been developed based on 1 GSPS A/D converters in conjunction with multiple on-board DSP components. Several COTS transceiver components are employed in developing this radar platform with a goal to develop high bandwidth real-time radar applications.

Radar & Remote Sensing Lab

PCB Prototyping Facility

RFID Laboratory

RFID Laboratory The ESL has extensive RFID testing and development facility. We

have partnerships with companies to develop RFID systems for a variety of commercial applications, including inventory, security, item locating, and RFID tags for automotive tires. Much research is also carried out on RFID and antennas for energy harvesting. These specialized RFID tags are intended to support a variety of wireless sensors for health and industrial monitoring applications. Recently energy harvesting RFIDs have achieved as much as 80% efficiency.

Hyperspectral Engine Lab for Integrated Optical Systems (HELIOS) Laboratory

The Hyperspectral Engine Lab for Integrated Optical Systems (HELIOS) Laboratory is solely focused on exploring the uncharted THz spectrum by acquiring equipment and engaging several companies and government agencies in collaborative projects. The ongoing projects at HELIOS focus on THz imaging, spectroscopy, material characterization, next generation THz integrated circuits for high data rate proximity communications, active monitoring, quality control of electronic chips, pharmaceutical product quality control at the production line, and biomedical applications such as tissue imaging, detection and identification. The primary goal of the HELIOS laboratory is to facilitate the development of faster, smaller, higher power and cheaper terahertz devices.

The major THz test equipment at the HELIOS Laboratory is:

• THz time domain Spectrometer & Imager (TeraView TPS300 covering 60GHz-3THz)

• THz CW spectrometer (100GHz-1.5THz) • Agilent VNA with VDI modules covering form 90GHz -

750GHz for device & material characterization and a coherent imaging spectrometer

• 2D THz video Camera (0.6-1.2THz)—developed at ESL • Microtech BWO THz source (covering 0.5-1.14THz) • Microtech Golay Cell THz Detector (0.02-20THz) • Hyperspectral 3D imaging system covering from IR to 2 THz

(Photon-X Inc.) • Cascade probe stations and probes from 40-500GHz • 4-point probe measurement system for DC conductivity

measurement

HELIOS Laboratory

Material Characterization Techniques at the ESL

Besides the equipment listed previously that can be used for fee-space and waveguide material characterization, ESL has four measurement fixtures for material (including metamaterials and magneto-dielectrics) characterization. These four fixtures have been tested in characterizing/extracting the permittivity (ε), permeability (µ), conductivity (σ), resistivity (ρ), and loss-tangent (tanδ) values. Broadband and anisotropic characterizations have been carried out to observe material dispersive characteristics. Of importance is that these techniques allow for small and large anisotropic sample characterization 50MHz and up. That is, the OSU-ESL fixtures overcome the limited bandwidth of commercial impedance analyzer (< 1 GHz) due to parasitic inductance and capacitance. Among the measurement techniques depicted in figure we note the following:

• Synthetic Gaussian beam method with no restrictions in sample shape. Diffraction at the sample edges can also be avoided by illuminating the sample with a focused Gaussian beam. For lower cost, a scanning probe over a virtual aperture was used to emulate the synthetic aperture radar process.

• For frequencies below <5 GHz, we developed a tapered stripline method to characterize smaller samples (< λ/4 in size) down to 50 MHz. The fixture supports TEM mode propagation over wide bandwidth and permits greater measurement flexibility by adjusting the fixture height. This approach is suitable for reasonably thick samples but not accurate for extremely thin ones (< 1 mm in thickness).

• For thin material composites, ESL has available planar microstrip line structure for accurate measurements. This fixture was integrated with a new material property de-embedding process that relies on full-wave simulations to avoid uncertainties in conventional quasi-static de-embedding processes.

• For highly conductive composites, it is important to extract conductivity (σ) and resistivity (ρ) parameter measurements. For such measurements, ESL has available an open-ended coaxial probe to characterize σ and ρ of metallo-dielectric films over 200 MHz to 20 GHz.

Agilent impedance analyzer for homogeneous and isotropic materials

(1 MHz – 3 GHz)

Resonant cavity for uniaxial dielectrics

(8 GHz – 12 GHz)

Waveguide for dielectric slabs

(8 GHz – 12 GHz)

Synthetic Gaussian beam for multilayer metamaterial slabs

(8 GHz – 12 GHz)

Tapered stripline for bulk composites

(50 MHz – 4.5 GHz)

Microstrip line for thin anisotropic films

(50 MHz – 4.5 GHz)

Coaxial probe for conductive films

(200 MHz – 20 GHz)