Invited: Factors Limiting the Upper Frequency of mm-Wave Spherical Near-field Test Systems

Daniël Janse van Rensburg

Nearfield Systems Inc, USA

Abstract

Ongoing development of on-chip antennas operating at mm-Wave frequencies have led to the development of spherical near-field test systems operational at much higher frequencies than before. A natural progression is to apply these systems at even higher frequencies. This paper addresses some of the factors limiting this frequency bound. These include mechanical positioning repeatability, absolute position fidelity, RF sub-system stability, spherical near-field sampling requirements and required far-field distances. Correction techniques that can be employed to enhance the performance of such measurement systems are also considered and evaluated.

CV

Dr Janse van Rensburg has been working in the microwave test industry for the past 25 years. He specializes in microwave antenna measurement systems, computational electromagnetics and antenna design & analysis. He graduated from the University of Pretoria, South Africa and was awarded the B. Eng, M. Eng and Ph.D. degrees in 1985, 1987 and 1991 respectively, all in Electrical Engineering. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE, Licensed Professional Engineer in Ontario, Canada and a Fellow of the Antenna Measurement Techniques Association (AMTA). He remains actively involved in academia and was appointed as adjunct professor in 2005 in the School of Information Technology and Engineering, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada, where he provides post graduate student research supervision.