Transmission line approach of left-handed (LH) materials and microstrip implementation of an artificial LH transmission line

A transmission line (TL) approach of left-handed (LH) materials is proposed. The transmission characteristics of an ideal LH-TL are presented, the constitutive parameters of an equivalent LH material are derived and shown to be negative, and some LH-transmission paradoxes are explained. Next, a method to design an artificial LH-TL in the form of an ideal lumped-elements ladder network is described and illustrated with simulation results. It is shown that, in this line, left-handedness can be achieved without losses over an unlimited bandwidth, from the cutoff of the resulting high-pass filter to infinity, with excellent agreement with theory. Finally, a microstrip implementation of the LH line for microwaves, using interdigital capacitors and stub inductors, is demonstrated, with moderate insertion loss and a broad bandwidth of the order of 100%.