IEEE MICROWAVE AND WIRELESS COMPONENTS LETTERS, VOL. 17, NO.

8, AUGUST 2007 583

Dual-Band Bandpass Filters Using

Stub-Loaded Resonators
Xiu Yin Zhang, Student Member, IEEE, Jian-Xin Chen, Student Member, IEEE, Quan Xue, Senior Member, IEEE,
and Si-Min Li

Abstract—Dual-band bandpass filters using novel stub-loaded

resonators (SLRs) are presented in this letter. Characterized by
both theoretical analysis and full-wave simulation, the proposed
SLR is found to have the advantage that the even-mode resonant
frequencies can be flexibly controlled whereas the odd-mode res-
onant frequencies are fixed. Based on the proposed SLR, a dual-
band filter is implemented with three transmission zeros. To fur-
ther improve the selectivity, a filter with four transmission zeros on
either side of both passbands is designed by introducing spur-line.
The measured results validate the proposed design.

Index Terms—Bandpass filter (BPF), dual-band, stub-loaded

resonator (SLR).

I. INTRODUCTION

HERE is an increasing demand of dual-band microwave Fig. 1. (a) Structure of the proposed stub-loaded resonator, (b) odd-mode

T devices. To meet the demand, much research has been car-

ried out [1]–[9]. In [1], a dual-band bandpass filter (BPF) was
equivalent circuit, and (c) even-mode equivalent circuit.

achieved by a cascade connection of a BPF and a bandstop filter,

with the drawback of a large circuit size. In [2], a resonator is
embedded in another one to obtain two passbands. Dual-band
filters can also be realized by combining two sets of resonators
with common input and output [3], [4]. Besides utilizing two or
more resonators, a dual-band filter can be designed by using a
stepped-impedance resonator (SIR) [5]–[8]. However, the reso-
nant frequencies of SIRs are dependent, complicating the filter
design. In [9], a dual-band transformer is introduced to realize
90 phase shift at two frequencies and applied to dual-band
branch-line coupler design.
In this letter, a novel stub-loaded resonator (SLR) is intro-
duced to design dual-band filters. The properties of the proposed
SLR are analyzed theoretically and confirmed by full-wave sim-
ulation. Compared with the transformer in [9] whose operating
frequencies are dependent, this resonator has easily controlled
resonant frequencies. Its resonant frequencies of even-mode can
be conveniently tuned, while those of the odd-mode remain al-
most the same. Using the proposed SLR, a dual-band BPF is
designed with three transmission zeros. To obtain higher skirt
selectivity, spur-line is introduced to create another transmis-
sion zero. Consequently, a dual-band filter is realized with four
transmission zeros on either side of both passbands. Finally, the
two filters are implemented. Predicted responses are well con-
firmed by the measured results.
II. ANALYSIS ON THE PROPOSED STUB-LOADED RESONATOR
The proposed SLR consists of a conventional microstrip half-
wavelength resonator and an open stub as shown in Fig. 1(a),
where , , and denote the characteristic admittances
and lengths of the microstrip line and open stub, respectively.
The open stub is shunted at the midpoint of the microstrip line.
Since the SLR is symmetrical in structure, odd- and even-mode
analysis can be adopted to characterize it.
For odd-mode excitation, there is a voltage null along the
middle of the SLR. This leads to the approximate equivalent cir-
cuit of Fig. 1(b). The resulting input admittance for odd-mode
can be expressed as

(1)
Manuscript received February 14, 2007; revised May 2, 2007. This work was
supported by the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong Special Administrative
Region, China, under Grant CityU121905. where is the electric length of the microstrip line.
X. Y. Zhang, J.-X. Chen, and Q. Xue are with the Wireless Communica- From the resonance condition of 0, the odd-mode
tions Research Center, Department of Electronic Engineering, City University
of Hong Kong, Kowloon, China (e-mail: zhangxiuyin@hotmail.com).
resonant frequencies can be deduced as
S.-M. Li is with Guilin University of Electronic Technology, Guilin 541004,
China. (2)
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LMWC.2007.901768

1531-1309/$25.00 © 2007 IEEE

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 584 IEEE MICROWAVE AND WIRELESS COMPONENTS LETTERS, VOL. 17, NO. 8, AUGUST 2007

where 1,2,3, is the speed of light in free space, and

denotes the effective dielectric constant of the substrate. It
can be observed that the odd-mode resonant frequencies are not
affected by the open stub.
For even-mode excitation, there is no current flow through the
symmetrical plane. Thus we can bisect the circuit with open cir-
cuits at the middle to obtain the equivalent circuit of Fig. 1(c).
Ignoring the discontinuity of the folded section, the input admit-
tance for even-mode can be approximately obtained as

(3)

where is the electric length of the open stub. The

resonance condition is 0. Thus, at the even-mode
resonant frequencies, it can be derived as

(4)
Fig. 2. Operating frequencies against stub length.
For the special case of

(5)

Therefore, the resonance condition for this special case is

(6)

or

(7)

where is the guided wavelength at even-mode resonance. The

even-mode resonant frequencies for the case of 2 can
thus be attained as

(8)

To verify the above results, full-wave simulation is carried

out by using IE3D. Two microstrip lines with 50 character-
istic impedance are utilized to feed the proposed SLR using
loose coupling. The length is fixed at 40 mm, corresponding
to 2 at the fundamental odd-mode resonant frequency. As
shown in Fig. 2, by changing the stub length , the funda-
mental even-mode resonant frequency can be shifted within a
wide range, whereas the fundamental odd-mode resonant fre-
quency is preserved.
III. DUAL-BAND FILTER DESIGN
A. A Dual-Band Filter With Three Transmission Zeros
Based on the proposed SLR, a dual-band filter is designed.
The configuration is shown in Fig. 3(a). It consists of two
folded SLRs. Compared with the conventional open-loop
resonator [10], this one has an extra open stub loaded inside
the open loop, indicating that dual-band operation is obtained
without a size increase. The passband frequencies are mainly
determined by the entire length of the open loop and the length
of the open stub. The passband bandwidths of this filter depend
on the external quality factors and the coupling coefficients
Fig. 3. Filter configuration. (a) A filter with three transmission zeros. (b) A
filter with four transmission zeros.
between the two resonators. Therefore, the gap and distance
determine the bandwidths. The substrate used in this design
has a relative dielectric constant of 6.15 and a thickness of
0.635. The dimensions are chosen as follows: 0.9 mm,
1.2 mm, 1.5 mm, 11.2 mm, 6.7 mm,
0.6 mm, 0.3 mm, 0.3 mm. Based on (2) and (4),
the expected passband frequencies are 1.68 and 2.81 GHz.
The simulation and measurement are accomplished by using
IE3D and 8753ES network analyzer, respectively. Fig. 4 shows
the simulated and measured results. Good agreement between
them is observed. The two passbands are centered at 1.83 and
2.94 GHz, which confirm the analytical results. Note that in
the analysis only one resonator is considered, whereas two res-
onators are utilized in this design. The coupling between the two
resonators, as well as the coupling between the two ends of each

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 ZHANG et al.: DUAL-BAND BANDPASS FILTERS
Fig. 4. Frequency responses of the filter with three transmission zeros.
open loop will influence the resonant frequencies, leading to
the slight deviation between analytical and experimental results.
The lower and upper passbands have the fractional bandwidths
of 9.4% and 7.5%, respectively. The insertion losses of lower
and upper passbands are only 0.9 dB and 1.1 dB. In both pass-
bands, the measured return losses are better than 20 dB. Three
transmission zeros are realized with more than 45 dB attenua-
tions. All stopbands obtain the rejection levels of about 30 dB.
B. A Dual-Band Filter With Four Transmission Zeros
The above filter obtained three transmission zeros. If another
transmission zero can be achieved, the selectivity will be further
improved. Spur-line has been proven successful to create trans-
mission zeros [11], [12]. Thus, spur-line is introduced in this
design to achieve sharper roll-off, resulting in a configuration
shown in Fig. 3(b). The spur-line has a total length of 15.2 mm,
which approximately corresponds to the quarter guided wave-
length at the frequency of the newly introduced transmission
zero. Other dimensions of the spur-line are as follows:
0.3 mm, 0.3 mm.
The simulated and measured results are illustrated in Fig. 5.
Consistent with the preceding filter, this one has two passbands
centered at 1.84 and 2.9 GHz with the fractional bandwidths of
8.1% and 6.8%. The insertion losses, including the losses from
SMA connector, are 1.7 and 1.6 dB at the lower and upper pass-
bands, and the return losses within the two passbands are below
10 dB. The attenuation of over 55 dB is observed between
the two passbands. The measured results are in good agreement
with the full-wave simulated ones. Slight deviation is observed,
which could be attributed to fabrication tolerance in the imple-
mentation.
IV. CONCLUSION
In this letter, a novel SLR is proposed. The properties of SLR
are obtained by theoretical analysis and verified by simulation
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585
Fig. 5. Frequency responses of the filter with four transmission zeros.
and experiment. The newly proposed SLR possesses the advan-
tage that its resonant frequencies of even-mode can be flexibly
controlled, whereas those of odd-mode are fixed. Based on the
proposed SLR, two filters have been implemented with three
and four transmission zeros. The measured results agree well
with simulated ones.
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