Slow‐wave substrate integrated suspended parallel strip line and its application to rat‐race coupler.

This paper presents a slow‐wave substrate integrated suspended parallel strip line (SW‐SISPSL) for the first time. The slow‐wave effect is produced by cascading high/low‐impedance SISPSL in the meander line configuration. Different from conventional single‐ended slow‐wave transmission lines, the proposed SW‐SISPSL supports differential signal transmission. The characteristic impedance and slow‐wave factor of the SW‐SISPSL are analyzed using equivalent circuit models. Using the proposed SW‐SISPSL and a SISPSL phase inverter, a very compact rat‐race coupler is implemented. The core circuit area of the slow‐wave rat‐race coupler is 0.083 λg × 0.089 λg, which is only 4.12% of the conventional topology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]