Analysis of the suspended H-waveguide and other related dielectric waveguide structures

In this thesis, the field and propagation characteristics of many dielectric waveguide structures that are of direct importance to the areas of millimeter-wave integrated circuits are studied. A rigorous method of analysis of the propagation constants and the field distributions of a newly developed suspended H-waveguide based on the mode matching techniques is described. The derived eigenvalue equation for determining the propagation constant of this waveguide structure is very general and can be applied directly to other planar dielectric structures of rectangular cross section. However, for applications where only approximate values of the propagation constants are necessary, simple effective parameter approximations are employed. Even though the effective parameter approximations do not provide very accurate results for the propagation constants in some cases, they always provide useful information on the whereabouts and the existences of certain modes which, in turn, can be used as the initial values for iterating in the more rigorous mode matching technique. As frequency increases, the values obtained by the effective parameter technique approach those obtained by the mode matching method.