Acta Photonica Sinica, Volume. 52, Issue 10, 1052411(2023)

Research and Design of a Differential Microwave Sensor Based on ICS-SRR(Invited)

Wenjing WU and Liang PENG*
Author Affiliations
  • School of Information and Electrical Engineering,Hangzhou City University,Hangzhou 310015,China
  • show less

    In the traditional Split Ring Resonator (SRR) -based microwave microstrip sensor, the microstrip line is coupled with SRR, and the mantic coupling is appeared between microstrip line and SRR. The electrical filed is distributed at the gap of SRR. A high resonant frequency is occurred due to the relatively low equivalent capacitance. And, the traditional SRR-based sensor shows a low sensitivity. In order to improve the detection sensitivity, an Interdigital Capacitance Structure (ICS) is inserted into the opening of the split ring resonator to enhance the density of electric field. From the simulated distribution of electrical field, it can be seen that more electrical field is concentrated at the slot of interdigital capacitance with comparison to traditional SRR-based sensor. The meander slot can increase the interacted path of electrical field, create a higher equivalent capacitance, so more electrical field is focused on the slot of interdigital capacitance. As known, the external environmental factors, such as temperature, humidity, gas pressure, etc, can cause an influence on the measured results and result in a large measurement error. In order to suppress the interferences of external environment, a differential structure is added. With comparison to traditional microstrip sensors, the proposed differential microwave sensor can overcome low sensitivity and effects of environment factors. The designed differential structure adopts the form of two split ring resonators distributed on both sides of a single microstrip line, and the microstrip line is coupled with the two split-ring resonators, and the magnetic couplings distributed on both sides are equal. An equivalent circuit model is adopted to analyze the operating principle of proposed microwave sensor, the element values of equivalent circuit model are calculated, then Keysight ADS is adopted to fine-tune all the element values to match the simulation results. It can be found that there is a good agreement between them. The consistent also reveals the correctness of proposed equivalent circuit model. Besides, mathematical analysis is utilized to explain the phenomenon that the ICS-SRR has a higher confined electrical field than traditional SRR. Then, simulation and experimental results both verify the correctness of theoretical analysis. In the experiment, one resonator serves as the reference unit and the other resonator serves as the measurement unit. The liquid under test is placed at the test resonator. In measurement, the water-ethanol mixtures with water concentrations changing from 0% to 100% with a step of 20% are adopted to establish the mathematical model. As the mixture solutions of water-ethanol with different volume fractions of water are injected, the resonance frequency of the measurement unit will show significant frequency shift and notch amplitude deviation compared to the reference unit. The deviations of resonant frequency and notched magnitude can be used to fit the complex permittivity. Then, in order to demonstrate the correctness of established mathematical model, the water-ethanol mixtures with water concentrations altering from 10% to 90% with a step of 20% are utilized. By substituting the measured resonant frequencies and notched magnitudes for water-ethanol mixtures with water concentrations changing from 10% to 90% into the established mathematical model, the real and imaginary parts of complex permittivity for water-ethanol mixtures with water concentration changing from 10% to 90% can be obtained. The experimental results show that the average sensitivity of per unit volume of the proposed sensor can reach 3.630 8%/μL, which is several times higher than the other designs. In addition, the proposed microwave sensor can also be adopted to measure other binary mixed solutions by establishing the corresponding mathematical models.

    Tools

    Get Citation

    Copy Citation Text

    Wenjing WU, Liang PENG. Research and Design of a Differential Microwave Sensor Based on ICS-SRR(Invited)[J]. Acta Photonica Sinica, 2023, 52(10): 1052411

    Download Citation

    EndNote(RIS)BibTexPlain Text
    Save article for my favorites
    Paper Information

    Category:

    Received: Mar. 9, 2023

    Accepted: May. 4, 2023

    Published Online: Dec. 5, 2023

    The Author Email: PENG Liang (pengl@zucc.edu.cn)

    DOI:10.3788/gzxb20235210.1052411

    Topics