| The Center for Wireless
Integrated MicroSystems (WIMS), an Engineering Research Center headquartered
at the University of Michigan and funded by NSF, has developed a more efficient
and powerful antenna for integration with computer chips. Previous
attempts to attach antennas to chips resulted in very low efficiencies.
This new advance will hasten the development of stand-alone wireless systems
not much larger than the size of a single computer chip. The tiny device
replaces the pull-out antenna in a cell phone, for example.
Integration of an antenna
with the rest of a transceiver on a single integrated circuit is perhaps
the last barrier to achieving a totally integrated single-chip wireless
system. In the past, on-chip dipole antennas fabricated in standard
processes have had low efficiency primarily due to the close proximity
to the silicon substrate underneath the antenna. The substrate significantly
reduces the gain and radiation efficiency of these antennas.
The WIMS center used a slot-type
antenna instead of a dipole antenna, which has the effect of shielding
the antenna from the silicon substrate that limited its effectiveness in
prior standard designs. Both a chip manufacturer and a national laboratory
have been in discussions with the faculty involved about the possibility
of adopting the new technology into their products. |
