Behavior of Wire, Resistors,

Capacitors, Inductors at High

Frequencies

Dimensions and Units

To understand the upper frequency limit, beyond which conventional
circuit theory can no longer be applied to analyze an electric system, we
should recall the representation of an electromagnetic wave.

Dimensions and Units

Propagation constant/Phase constant represents the change in phase per
meter along the path travelled by the wave at any instant and is equal to the
wave number of the wave.

Intrinsic impedance: the ratio between electric and magnetic field

components.

TEM Waves: field components are perpendicular to each other and both
are perpendicular to the direction of propagation.

Dimensions and Units

TE Waves: in this magnetic field component is perpendicular to the
direction of propagation.
TM Waves: in this electric field component is perpendicular to the
direction of propagation.
The phase velocity of the TEM wave can be found as

RF Behavior of Passive Components

From the knowledge of circuit theory
R is frequency independent
C and L are frequency dependent
Capacitive and inductive reactance

For the low frequency; R, C and L are created by wires, plates and coils
respectively
Printed circuit board (PCB) layout has frequency dependent resistance and
inductance

Cond.
DC excitation
AC excitation
Skin effect
For high frequency condition(f500MHz)

Conductivity
Copper =64.516106S/m
Aluminum =40.0106S/m
Gold =48.544106S/m

Cond

From this we conclude that resistance increases inversely proportional to

the cross-sectional skin area

AWG System
Diameter of the wire is determined by its
AWG value
General rule: the diameter of the wire is
doubles every six wire gauges starting
with 1mil for a AWG 50 wire

High Frequency Resistors

c
Electric equivalent circuit
representation of the
resistor

Electric equivalent circuit representation

for high frequency wire-wound
resistance

High Frequency Capacitors

In RF/Microwave circuits chip capacitors find widespread applications
Tuning of filters
Matching networks
Biasing active components

Displacement current
At high frequency, dielectric becomes lossy, there is a conduction current
flow

Current flow at DC is due to the conductance,

Cond
Loss tangent is defined by the angle between the capacitors impedance
vector and the negative reactive axis

Cond

Electric equivalent circuit for a high frequency capacitor

Loss Tangent
Loss tangent can also be defined as the
ratio of an equivalent series resistance to
the capacitors reactance

High Frequency Inductors

RF/Microwave biasing networks
RFCs (Matching and Tuning)
Distributed capacitance and series resistance in the inductor coil

Equivalent circuit of the high-frequency inductor

High Frequency Inductors

Quality factor: determines the resistive loss in the passive circuit