258
5, MAY 2006
Broadband Digital Phase Shifter Based on Switchable
Right- and Left-Handed Transmission Line Sections
Dmitry Kholodnyak, Member, IEEE, Elena Serebryakova, Irina Vendik, Member, IEEE, and
Orest Vendik, Member, IEEE
Abstract—A novel approach to design digital phase shifters with
the operational bandwidth extended to one octave is presented. An
original design of the broadband phase shifter based on switching
between transmission lines (TLs) with positive and negative dis-
persions is considered. An artificial TL with the negative disper-
sion was implemented as a quasilumped-element coplanar struc-
ture using a multilayer technology. The simulated and measured
performance of the 180 phase shifter is presented.
Index Terms—Multilayer, phase shifter, positive and negative
dispersion, quasilumped elements, right/left-handed (RH/LH)
transmission lines (TLs).
I. INTRODUCTION
T HE digital phase shifters using switchable channels are
well known [1]. Phase shift is obtained by switching be-
tween two transmission lines (TLs) of different lengths or be-
tween lumped-element low-pass and high-pass filters.
The switched line phase shifter exhibits an extremely broad-
band matching in both states, if the characteristic impedance of
the TL sections is chosen being equal to the port impedance.
Since the phase shift depends linearly on frequency, it is basi-
cally a constant time-delay circuit [1].
The switched filter phase shifter originally proposed in [2]
is a constant phase-shift circuit. Frequency response of the two
filters is such that as the frequency increases, the increase in
phase delay in the low-pass state is compensated by the de-
crease in phase advance in the high-pass state. Thus, a rather
flat phase shift together with low voltage standing wave ratio
(VSWR) can be achieved over a wide frequency range by
controlling values of filter elements. In [2], a phase shift of
90 4 was theoretically shown possible in one octave band-
width with VSWR of about 1.2 for the three-pole filters. It was
also postulated that the bandwidth of the large phase-shift bits
may be improved by using more elements in the high-pass and
low-pass circuits.
Using the same switched channel concept but other type of
passive networks with different phase incursions, broadband
Manuscript received October 31, 2005; revised January 30, 2006. This work
was supported by the Network of Excellence “Metamorphose” under Project
500252 (the 6th Framework Programme of the European Commission).
D. Kholodnyak, E. Serebryakova, and I. Vendik are with the Microwave
Microelectronics Laboratory, Department of Microelectronics and Radio
Engineering, St. Petersburg Electrotechnical University, St. Petersburg 197376,
Russia (e-mail: dvkholodnyak@mail.eltech.ru; mwlab@eltech.ru; ibvendik@
eltech.ru).
O. Vendik is with Department of Physical Electronics and Technology, St.
Petersburg Electrotechnical University, St. Petersburg 197376, Russia (e-mail:
ogvendik@mail.eltech.ru).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LMWC.2006.873593
1531-1309/$20.00 © 2006 IEEE
IEEE MICROWAVE AND WIRELESS COMPONENTS LETTERS, VOL. 16, NO.
phase shift circuits can be realized. Two switched TLs, one
with positive dispersion and another with negative one, can be
considered as a novel design approach combining the benefits
of switchable channel phase shifters of both kinds.
This letter presents a design of a broadband digital phase
shifter based on switching between a conventional TL with
positive dispersion and an artificial metamaterial TL having
negative dispersion. The 180 phase shifter with one octave
operational bandwidth realized as coplanar multilayer structure
is reported.
II. OPERATIONAL PRINCIPLE AND DESIGN APPROACH
A conventional TL, in which the phase and group velocities
are codirectional, has a positive dispersion and is referred to the
right-handed transmission line (RH TL). The phase incursion
along an RH TL is negative. An artificial version of the RH TL
can be formed as a ladder network consisting of inductors con-
nected in series and shunt capacitors. According to the principle
of duality, the TL with interchanged inductors and capacitors
can be considered as a so-called left-handed transmission line
(LH TL) characterizing by a negative dispersion with the op-
posite directions of the phase and group velocities [3], [4]. The
phase incursion along an LH TL is positive, that corresponds to
the negative electrical length.
Switching between the RH TL and LH TL sections with the
electrical lengths, which are the same by absolute value at the
central frequency and differ in sign, results in rather parallel runs
of the phase characteristics providing almost constant phase
shift over a fairly large bandwidth. One can theoretically show
that switching between the ideal RH TL and LH TL provides
the phase shift error of 3% in the bandwidth of one octave
and about 12.5% over two octaves for any value of the phase
shift. Moreover, if the characteristic impedance of the both TLs
is equal to the port impedance, the perfect matching is provided
in any frequency range for the both states.
Since a real LH TL does not exist in the nature, an artificial
lumped-element implementation of the LH TL has to be used
while the RH TL can be realized as either a lumped-element
structure or the natural TL. A symmetrical lumped-element T-
or -network can be considered as an equivalent circuit of a
TL section with either positive or negative dispersion. Rela-
tion between equivalent circuit elements and TL characteristic
impedance and electrical length at the central frequency are de-
termined by equations derived by comparing ABCD-matrices
of TL section and corresponding T- or -network.
In general, a TL of the electrical length can be replaced by
the equivalent -circuit containing one single cell or a series
connection of single cells with equivalent electrical length .
KHOLODNYAK et al.: BROADBAND DIGITAL PHASE SHIFTER
Fig. 1. Phase response of artificial RH TL and LH TL consisting of different
number of LC -cells (single LC -cell—dashed lines, two cascaded LC -cells—
dash-dot lines, and ideal TL section—solid lines).
The higher number of single cells , the closer is the character-
istic of the artificial lumped-component TL to the characteristic
of the ideal TL section. It can be easily shown that for the smaller
phase shifts 90 , the operational bandwidth of one oc-
tave is achieved by using the single T- or -cells. In the case of the
180 phase shifter two cascaded single cells are enough to pro-
vide the same bandwidth regarding both the flat phase shift and
suitable input matching (Fig. 1). Further increasing the number of
cells seems to be impractical because of inefficient broadening
the bandwidth with respect to the phase shift.
Using the natural RH TL section is preferable for practical de-
sign rather than its artificial implementation. The digital phase
shifter under consideration is shown in Fig. 2. In one state the
signal is passing through the natural RH TL section providing a
negative phase incursion whereas in another state the artifi-
cial LH TL section with a positive phase incursion is being
switched on. Phase shift is obtained by switching
the signal path with the aid of two single-pole double-throw
(SPDT) switches. The design approach for such a phase shifter
consists of the following steps:
— the characteristic impedance of both the RH TL and LH
TL sections is chosen the same as the port impedance;
— the RH TL is designed as the natural TL with electrical
length 2, where is the desired phase shift;
— the artificial LH TL with the equivalent electrical length
2 is realized as two cascaded lumped element
T- or -cells in the case of 180 phase shift and as one
single cell for smaller phase shifts.
III. DESIGN AND INVESTIGATION OF 180 PHASE SHIFTER
In order to demonstrate a feasibility of the design approach
mentioned above, a 180 phase shifter with one octave oper-
ational bandwidth (2–4 GHz) was developed [5]. The phase
shifter uses switching between the natural RH TL section with
the phase incursion of 90 at the central frequency and the ar-
tificial lumped-element LH TL section providing the phase in-
cursion of 90 . Characteristic impedance of both the RH TL
259
Fig. 2. Digital phase shifter based on switchable RH TL and LH TL sections.
Fig. 3. Photograph of the fabricated 180 coplanar phase shifter.
and the LH TL was chosen equal to 50 . To extend the op-
erational bandwidth with respect to the input matching, the ar-
tificial LH TL was designed as a cascaded connection of two
identical lumped-element T-networks with 45 phase incur-
sion each (see Fig. 2).
Fig. 3 shows a coplanar realization of the phase shifter de-
signed. The phase shifter was manufactured on 1-mm-thick alu-
mina substrate by means of the sandwich multilayer technology
using the screen printing technique [6]. Two 15- m-thick con-
ductive layers separated from each other by the additional di-
electric layer with the thickness of 60 m and the dielectric
permittivity 10.2 were employed to form serial capacitors
of the artificial LH TL. Quasilumped grounded inductors were
situated on the bottom conductive layer and connected to the
ground plane by via holes. The coplanar RH TL section was im-
plemented on the top conductive layer. The channel switching
was carried out by surface mounted – – diodes. The dimen-
sions of the fabricated phase shifter are 21 14 1.1 mm.
Accordingly to the results of EM simulation taking into ac-
count an equivalent circuit of the – – diode in two states, the
device provides the 180 phase shift with a variation of 5 in
more than one octave bandwidth (1.8–4.1 GHz, i.e., 85%). In
both states the return loss is better than 15 dB and the inser-
tion loss does not exceed 0.55 dB in the same frequency range.
The insertion loss level corresponds to the figure of merit of
the phase shifter [7] estimated as 330 /dB. Simulated ampli-
tude characteristics and the phase shift of the phase shifter in
the specified operational bandwidth are shown by dashed lines
in Figs. 4 and 5, respectively.
260 IEEE MICROWAVE AND WIRELESS COMPONENTS LETTERS, VOL. 16, NO. 5, MAY 2006

Fig. 4. Simulated (dashed lines) and measured (solid lines) amplitude characteristics of the 180 phase shifter for two states: (a) RH TL section is switched on
and (b) LH TL section is switched on.

IV. CONCLUSION
Using specific dispersion properties of the RH TL and LH
TL makes it possible to design broadband digital phase shifters.
The broadband 180 phase shifter based on switching between
the natural coplanar RH TL and the artificial lumped-element
LH TL section was designed, fabricated and experimentally in-
vestigated. The simulation and measurement results confirmed
the ability of the device to exhibit a high performance over the
operational bandwidth of one octave.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors wish to thank E. Gerasimov, V. Kuznetsov, and
B. Makhov, for manufacturing and assembling the experimental
samples, and P. Kapitanova, for her assistance in the measure-
ment of the phase shifter characteristics.
Fig. 5. Simulated (dashed line) and measured (solid lines) phase shift and phase
responses for two states of the 180 phase shifter. REFERENCES
[1] S. K. Koul and B. Bhat, Microwave and Millimeter Wave Phase
Shifters. Boston, MA: Artech House, 1991.
The experimental investigation was performed using HP [2] R. V. Garver, “Broad-band diode phase shifters,” IEEE Trans. Microw.
Theory Tech., vol. MTT-20, no. 4, pp. 314–323, May 1972.
8720B vector network analyzer. The measured characteristics [3] A. Lai, C. Caloz, and T. Itoh, “Composite right/left-handed transmis-
of the phase shifter are plotted in Figs. 4 and 5 in a comparison sion line metamaterials,” IEEE Microw. Mag., vol. 5, no. 3, pp. 34–50,
with the simulated ones. A good agreement between measured Sep. 2004.
[4] M. A. Antoniades and G. V. Eleftheriades, “A broadband Wilkinson
and simulated data is observed excepting a parasitic resonance balun using microstrip metamaterial lines,” IEEE Antennas Wireless
in the LH TL characteristics at 3.75 GHz, which could be Propag. Lett., vol. 4, pp. 209–212, 2005.
caused by an influence of the surface mounted – – diodes [5] O. G. Vendik, I. B. Vendik, D. V. Kholodnyak, S. P. Zubko, and E. V.
Serebryakova, “Electronically controlled phase shifters based on right/
and biasing networks. left-handed transmission lines,” in Proc. of 35th Eur. Microw. Conf.,
Within the frequency range 2.0–3.6 GHz the experimentally Paris, France, Oct. 2005, pp. 909–912.
[6] P. Kapitanova, A. Simin, D. Kholodnyak, and I. Vendik, “Application
observed phase shift was 180 7 . Measured value of the return of sandwich multilayer technology to MIC’s design,” in Proc. 35th Eur.
loss was not worse than 11 dB for the RH TL being switched on Microw. Conf., Paris, France, Oct. 2005, pp. 389–392.
and not less than 14 dB in the case of the LH TL. The insertion [7] V. Sherman, K. Astafiev, N. Setter, A. Tagantsev, O. Vendik, I.
Vendik, S. Hoffmann-Eifert, and R. Waser, “Digital reflection-type
loss was not higher than 0.7 dB for the RH TL and no more than phase shifter based on a ferroelectric planar capacitor,” IEEE Microw.
0.9 dB for the LH TL. Wireless Compon. Lett., vol. 11, no. 10, pp. 407–409, Oct. 2001.