A Low Profile Tunable Microwave Absorber based on Graphene Sandwich Structure and High Impedance Surface

TL;DR

This paper presents a compact, tunable microwave absorber using a graphene sandwich structure and high impedance surface, capable of dynamically adjusting absorption from 50% to 99.9% at 11.2GHz with a small form factor.

Contribution

It introduces a novel low-profile design combining graphene and high impedance surface for tunable microwave absorption, validated through theoretical, simulation, and experimental methods.

Findings

Achieves tunable absorption from -3dB to -30dB at 11.2GHz

Thickness of only 2.8mm, about one-tenth of wavelength

Experimental results align with simulations, confirming effectiveness

Abstract

In this paper, a low profile dynamically tunable microwave absorber is proposed, which consists of high impedance surface (HIS) and graphene sandwich structure (GSS). We theoretically demonstrate and experimentally verify that the proposed absorber can provide a dynamically tunable reflection range from larger than -3dB to less than -30 dB (corresponding to the absorption range from 50% to 99.9%) at opera-ting frequency of 11.2GHz by external bias voltage. The entire thickness of this absorber is only 2.8mm, nearly one tenth of working wavelength. In addition, a modified equivalent circuit model is proposed to explicate its absorption mechanism. At last, we fabricate a prototype absorber, and measure its absorption in anechoic chamber. The experimental results agree well with the full wave simulation results. This work may provide a reference for design and fabrication of dynamically tunable microwave absorber based on large-scale graphene and may promote the actual applications of graphene at microwave frequency.