Lightweight Multilayer Organic RF Front Ends for microwave and mm-wave Applications

During the last decade System-on-a-Package (SOP) RF Front Ends have been proposed as an alternative solution to System-on-Chip (SOC) RF architectures since they combine the best characteristics in terms of electrical, mechanical and packaging performance at a very competitive price. Initial limitations with respect to the useful frequency range of low cost RF SOP solutions have been overcome with the development of novel materials and fabrication techniques. This talk will present our recent work on multilayer organic RF front ends for X/Ka-band remote sensing and V-band high-speed wireless applications. Examples will include the development of low cost, flexible, lightweight X/Ka-band phased arrays with embedded SiGe and RF MEMS circuits using multilayer LCP/RXP layers laminated in a 3-D configuration, as well as the development of multilayer, high gain, broadband 60 GHz antenna arrays and circuits for low cost Gbps wireless links.

John Papapolymerou received the B.S.E.E. degree from the National Technical University of Athens, Athens, Greece, in 1993, the M.S.E.E. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, in 1994 and 1999, respectively. From 1999-2001 he was an Assistant Professor at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the University of Arizona, Tucson and during the summers of 2000 and 2003 he was a visiting professor at The University of Limoges, France. From 2001-2005 and 2005-2009 he was an Assistant Professor and Associate Professor, respectively, at the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the Georgia Institute of Technology, where he is currently a Professor. He has authored or coauthored over 250 publications in peer-reviewed journals and conferences. His research interests include the implementation of micromachining techniques and MEMS devices in microwave, millimeter-wave and THz circuits and the development of both passive and active planar circuits on semiconductor (Si/SiGe, GaAs) and organic substrates (liquid crystal polymer-LCP, LTCC) for System-on-a-Chip (SOC)/ System-on-a-Package (SOP) RF front ends.

He was the recipient of the 2009 IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques-Society (MTT-S) Outstanding Young Engineer Award, the 2009 School of ECE Outstanding Junior Faculty Award, the 2004 Army Research Office (ARO) Young Investigator Award, the 2002 National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award and the best paper award at the 3rd IEEE International Conference on Microwave and Millimeter-Wave Technology (ICMMT2002), Beijing, China.