Preliminary Investigation On Effective Grounding Measurement of

International Journal of Electronics and Communication Engineering & Technology (IJECET),
ISSN 0976 6464(Print), ISSN 0976 6472(Online), Special Issue (November, 2013), IAEME
International Conference on Communication Systems (ICCS-2013) October 18-20, 2013
B K Birla Institute of Engineering & Technology (BKBIET), Pilani, India Page 45

Preliminary Investigation on Effective Grounding Measurement of
Microstrip Line

Satya Sai Srikant

Assistant Professor, SRM University, Modinagar Campus, 201204, India

satya.srikant@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: This paper is to find the RF measurement when microstrip is effectively grounded.
The manufacturing method is used for grounding measurement for VIA hole inductance
measurement. The available structure for the present investigation was fabricated on GaAs
substrate. In this paper, wafer probing measurement and mean value of VIA hole inductance is
measured with vector network analyzer (VNA) with proper calibration, when the package is
effectively grounded. Further studies are in progress.

KEYWORDS: Microstrip, VNA, Groundings, VIA Hole, RF probe, Calibration

I. INTRODUCTION

The high frequency performance of monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMIC) is highly
affected by the way in which package is grounded. Microstrip has not any topside ground
plane, so some means of achieving a low inductance ground must require. The manufacturing
method grounding is used; requires a topside metallization pattern near the periphery of the
wafer which can be connected to the chip ground. If the field effect transistor (FET) is located
at the edge of the chip in MMIC, the source grounding can be affected by multiple wire bounds
to the surrounding chip carrier. Practically, FET does not locate near the chip edge as
grounding consideration and its calculations due to continuous variations will be very
cumbersome task [1].

II. MATERIAL AND METHODS

A. Raw Materials

Holes are chemically milled through the GaAs substrate (r = 10.8) until the topside
metallization is reached. Such a hole is called as VIA hole groundings. Fig. 1 shows a simplified
cross section of substrate with VIA holes in which it contains one VIA hole; that pad out to two
terminals. The signal / ground structure approximates to a 50 microstrip to the VIA hole and
is intended for wafer probing measurement. The layout minimizes the interconnecting
parasitic because the 50 microstrip is maintained up to the edges of the VIA hole. Fig. 2
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shows the equivalent circuit of Signal / Ground RF probe. The parameters of 50 microstrip
line segments are:

Zo(r ) =50 , l = 2771m, h = 200 m, r =12.8, =9

/ GHz, w =100 m

Fig. 1: Cross sectional view of microstrip with effective grounding

Fig. 2: Equivalent circuit of RF probe

B. Experimental Set up and Methods

The VIA grounding directly connect the signal conducting plane and ground plane of microstrip
that is to be measured for low valued inductance from vector network analyzer (VNA) with
manufacturing method [2]. Fig. 3 is the set up for measuring the VIA inductance. It is desired to
measure the mean value of VIA hole inductance by the manufacturing approach in the range of
1- 5 GHz. This helps in studying the effective dielectric constant and characteristic impedance
for microstrip with dispersion effect when the package is grounded.

Fig. 3: Set up for measuring the VIA inductance, Microstrip with VIA holes & Equivalent circuit
Ground
Plane
One Via Hole
100 Signal /
Ground
Signal Plane

III. ANALYTICAL METHOD

The S parameter S11 of a 50 microstrip line segment terminated by VIA hole and subsequent
de-embedding the line segment results in VIA inductance [1,3,4]. The S parameter (S11) is
measured with the help of vector network analyzer (VNA). With the help of S11, the input
impedance Zin can be found out by pressing Smith Chart menu in VNA. The load impedance Zl
for measured input impedance Zin can be evaluated by using Transmission line concept.

Z
n
=Z
o
_
Z
I
+]Z
o
ton0
Z
o
+]Z
I
ton0
_ =R +]X

Z
I
=R
c]]
+ ] X
c]]
=R
c]]
+ ]I
c]]

R
c]]
=|RZ
o
2
(Scc 0)
2
] [(R ton 0)
2
+ (Z
o
+X ton 0)
2
]

X
c]]
=||XZ
o
2
(Scc 0)
2
| +|X
2
+R
2
Z
o
2
| ton 0] [(R ton 0)
2
+ (Z
o
+X ton 0)
2
]

I
c]]
= X
c]]
2n

I
vu
=I
c]]

The calibration of RF probe and VNA must be needed before the measurement of VIA
inductance. The measurement of VIA inductance requires a one port calibration, so LRM (Line
Reflect Match) is the most convenient calibration. It means that in LRM technique, the short
calibration is not used.

IV. RESULT AND DISCUSSION

The measurement of VIA inductance in preliminary investigation on considering the effective
groundings of 50 microstrip line is shown in Table 1. This grounding includes the effect of
pad inductance. The investigation satisfies the estimated inductance of a VIA Hole is
approximation 25 100 pH / mm of substrate thickness. However in practical case, the value of
the mean VIA hole inductance is approximation 40 55 pH for 200 m substrate thickness.

Frequency
(GHz)
Measured
Re(Zin) in
Measured
Im(Zin) in
LVIA
(pH)
1 0.679 8.818 54.510
1.2 0.661 10.616 54.270
1.6 0.739 14.166 52.961
2 0.890 18.028 51.880
2.4 1.122 21.830 49.528
2.8 1.388 25.675 46.278
3.2 1.558 29.726 43.640
3.6 1.606 33.965 39.810
4 1.631 38.659 36.360
4.4 1.894 43.743 32.897
4.8 2.116 49.295 29.498
5 2.303 52.312 27.847
Table 1: Calculation of VIA Inductance (L
VIA
) {Mean L
VIA
= 43.29 pH}

V. CONCLUSION

The preliminary studies of effective grounding of microstrip are investigated with vector
network analyzer which shows the presence of impedance (VIA inductance) even though the
microstrip is effectively grounded. The value of VIA resistance measured from VNA shows that
it is almost zero. This shows that the high frequency performance of monolithic microwave
integrated circuits (MMIC) like microstrip with grounded is highly affected with VIA
inductance. This study is very useful in designing the filters, amplifiers, oscillators, antennas,
resonators, feeder, planner loads.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I am thankful to Prof. Manoj Kumar Pandey, Director of SRM University, Modinagar for
encouraging me to perform the research work in the field of RF and Microwave electronics.
Thanks are also due to some of the scientists and research faculites of various laboratories for
their invaluable suggestions on this subject.

REFERENCES

[1] Snow, Philip and Wilson Terry "Two techniques for characterizing MMIC VIA holes"
Microwaves and RF Jr, vol. 27, Sept. 1988, pp 98-101.
[2] R Pucel Design consideration for MMIC IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and
Techniques, June 1991,vol 29 (6), pp 513 534.
[3] R Faraji Dana and Y L Chow, The ac resistance of a microstripline and its ground plane, in
IEEE MTT-S Int. Microwave Symposium Digest, June 1989, Long Beach, CA.
[4] M Goldfarb and R Pucel, Modeling VIA hole grounds in microstrip, IEEE Microwave
Guided Wave Letter, vol. 1 (6) , June 1991, pp 135-137.

BIOGRAPHY

Satya Sai Srikant was born 1974 at Dhanbad, Jharkhand, India. He
received his M.Tech degree in Microwave Electronics from University of
Delhi, India in 2002. From 2002-2009, he worked as research area with
different position in various R & D Organizations, India in the field of RF
and applications of microwaves in Minerals and Materials Technology.
From 2009 onwards, he is working as Assistant Professor, in Department of
Electronics and Communication Engineering, SRM University, Modinagar,
India. The author has recently submitted his PhD thesis in Microwave area
at ITER Bhubaneswar, Odisha, India. His current research interests focus on
Microwave circuits, antennas, application of Microwave energy in Minerals and Materials
Technology and system interfacing with Microwaves.

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