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Exploration of Ultra-thin Alumina Ribbon Ceramic Substrate for 5G and mm-Wave Applications
Committee:
Dr. Swaminathan, Advisor
Dr. Tentzeris, Chair
Dr. Peterson
Abstract: The objective of the proposed research is to investigate the potential applications of ultra-thin Alumina Ribbon Ceramic substrate for 5G and mm-wave frequency regions. Showcased first at Ceramic Expo. 2019, Alumina Ribbon Ceramic has been developed at Corning Incorporated as an ultra-thin, flexible ceramic substrate available in different forms. Important characteristics of this material include high dielectric constant (~10), very low loss tangent (~0.0001), and high thermal conductivity (36 W/m-K), which provide an appealing opportunity for advancements in substrate packaging to realize ultra-miniaturized, high-performance passive components and tackle the thermal management issues posed in heterogeneous integration of passive and active components and modules in 5G mm-wave frequency region as well. Given the interesting characteristics of Alumina Ribbon Ceramic, not much is known about its electrical properties over a broad range of frequencies in the mm-wave and sub-mmwave regions. Hence, in this thesis proposal, first, we characterize a 40-μm-thick Alumina Ribbon Ceramic substrate in 30-170 GHz using microstrip ring resonator (MRR) method. The extracted dielectric constant and loss tangent of Alumina Ribbon Ceramic based on MRR method can provide valuable insights about the suitability of this new material technology for 5G and sub-THz packaging applications. Then, the applicability of Alumina Ribbon Ceramic for 5G and mm-wave packaging will be examined through demonstrating several passive components such as transmission lines, filters, diplexers, and integrated passive devices (IPDs). The fabricated components using semi-additive patterning (SAP) process on an 80-μm-thick Alumina Ribbon Ceramic substrate will be characterized in the 5G mm-wave frequency region and the measured results will be benchmarked against those of similar components on the state-of-the-art substrate technologies such as laminated glass, LTCC, and organic laminates in terms of performance and size. Additionally, the efficacy of Alumina Ribbon Ceramic substrate for thermal management of 5G packages will be studied through 3-D finite element modeling (FEM) simulations carried out in ANSYS.
