Journal
IEEE ACCESS
Volume 2, Issue -, Pages 874-882Publisher
IEEE-INST ELECTRICAL ELECTRONICS ENGINEERS INC
DOI: 10.1109/ACCESS.2014.2350531
Keywords
Aperture antenna; electrowetting; frequency-reconfigurable; liquid metal; reconfigurable antenna; slot antenna
Categories
Funding
- National Science Foundation [ECCS-1101936]
- National Consortium for Measures and Signatures Intelligence Research
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Continuous electrowetting (CEW) is demonstrated to be an effective actuation mechanism for reconfigurable radio frequency (RF) devices that use non-toxic liquid-metal tuning elements. Previous research has shown CEW is an efficient means of electrically inducing motion in a liquid-metal slug, but precise control of the slug's position within fluidic channels has not been demonstrated. Here, the precise positioning of liquid-metal slugs is achieved using CEW actuation in conjunction with channels designed to minimize the liquid-metal surface energy at discrete locations. This approach leverages the high surface tension of liquid metal to control its resting position with submillimeter accuracy. The CEW actuation and fluidic channel design were optimized to create reconfigurable RF devices. In addition, solutions for the reliable actuation of a gallium-based, non-toxic liquid-metal alloy (Galinstan) are presented that mitigate the tendency of the alloy to form a surface oxide layer capable of wetting to the channel walls, inhibiting motion. A reconfigurable slot antenna utilizing these techniques to achieve a 15.2% tunable frequency bandwidth is demonstrated.
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