Metallic waveguide with a dielectric core that is disposed on a non-planar or irregular surface of a substrate

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10128555-B2
Application number	US-201615374248-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 9, 2016
Priority date	Apr 9, 2014
Publication date	Nov 13, 2018
Grant date	Nov 13, 2018

Abstract

A digital system has a substrate having a top surface on which a waveguide is formed on the top surface of the substrate. The waveguide is formed by a conformal base layer formed on the top surface of the substrate, two spaced apart sidewalls, and a top conformal layer connected to the base layer to form a longitudinal core region. The waveguide may be a metallic or otherwise conductive waveguide, a dielectric waveguide, a micro-coax, etc.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A system comprising:
a substrate having a surface, the surface of the substrate being non-planar; and
a waveguide formed on the surface of the substrate, the waveguide comprising: a conformal base layer formed on the surface of the substrate; and a conformal top layer and two spaced apart sidewalls connected to the base layer to form a longitudinal core region.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the core region is a dielectric core comprising a dielectric material.

3. The system of claim 2 , wherein the dielectric core is a graded dielectric core comprising two or more longitudinal regions each having a different dielectric constant value.

4. The system of claim 2 , wherein the dielectric material has a dielectric constant value that varies over at least two values along the longitudinal extent of the dielectric core.

5. The system of claim 2 , wherein the dielectric material has a dielectric constant value selected from a range of approximately 2.4-12.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein the conformal base layer extends beyond the sidewalls.

7. The system of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the conformal base layer, the sidewalls, and the conformal top layer is metallic.

8. The system of claim 1 , further comprising:
a transmitting device coupled to the waveguide and operable to launch a radio frequency (RF) signal into the waveguide; and
a receiving device coupled to the waveguide and operable to receive a portion of the RF signal from the waveguide.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the transmitting device and the receiving device are mounted on the surface of the substrate.

10. The system of claim 1 , wherein the core region is hollow.

11. The system of claim 1 , wherein the surface of the substrate is irregular.

12. A method for forming a waveguide, the method comprising:
forming a base layer for the waveguide on a surface of a substrate, the surface of the substrate being irregular, and the base layer being formed to conform to the irregular surface of the substrate;
forming an elongated core region for the waveguide on the base layer;
forming a conformal top layer and sidewalls surrounding the elongated core region and in contact with the base layer.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the base layer, the sidewalls, and the top layer are formed by three dimensional printing onto the surface of the substrate.

14. The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
removing the elongated core region after forming the sidewalls and the conformal top layer.

15. The method of claim 12 , wherein forming the elongated core region comprises forming a graded core region having two or more different dielectric constant values.

16. The method of claim 12 , wherein the base layer is formed to extend beyond a footprint of the waveguide.

Assignees

• Texas Instruments Inc

Inventors

• Cook Benjamin S
• Herbsommer Juan Alejandro

Classifications

• H01P11/002

  Manufacturing hollow waveguides · CPC title

• H04B1/08

  Constructional details, e.g. cabinet · CPC title

• H01P11/006

  Manufacturing dielectric waveguides · CPC title

• H04B1/03

  Constructional details, e.g. casings, housings · CPC title

• H01P3/16

  Dielectric waveguides, i.e. without a longitudinal conductor · CPC title