Reflectarray antennas for terahertz communications

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the design, fabrication, and measurement of reflectarray antennas operating at around 1 THz, capable of deflecting incident terahertz beams with high efficiency for potential use in terahertz communications.

Contribution

It introduces a novel reflectarray design with resonant microstrip patches that effectively manipulate terahertz radiation, validated through experimental measurements.

Findings

Up to 80% of incident power deflected into the desired direction.

Effective beam deflection demonstrated at near 1 THz frequency.

Radiation patterns characterized for TM and TE polarizations.

Abstract

Reflectarrays composed of resonant microstrip gold patches on a dielectric substrate are demonstrated for operation at terahertz frequencies. Based on the relation between the patch size and the reflection phase, a progressive phase distribution is implemented on the patch array to create a reflector able to deflect an incident beam towards a predefined angle off the specular direction. In order to confirm the validity of the design, a set of reflectarrays each with periodically distributed 360*360 patch elements are fabricated and measured. The experimental results obtained through terahertz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) show that up to nearly 80% of the incident amplitude is deflected into the desired direction at an operation frequency close to 1 THz. The radiation patterns of the reflectarray in TM and TE polarizations are also obtained at different frequencies. This work presents an attractive concept for developing components able to efficiently manipulate terahertz radiation for emerging terahertz communications.