Inkjet printed ferrite-filled rectangular waveguide X-band isolator

For the first time, a rectangular waveguide (RWG) isolator realized through inkjet printing on a ferrite substrate is presented. Yttrium iron garnet (YIG) substrate is used for the realization of the ferrite-filled isolator. Contrary to the substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) approach, all four walls of the waveguide have been inkjet printed on the YIG substrate demonstrating the utility of inkjet printing process for realizing non-planar microwave components. The isolation is achieved by applying an anti-symmetrical DC magnetic bias to the ferrite-filled waveguide which then exhibits a unidirectional mode of operation. The isolator is fed by a microstrip to RWG transition and demonstrates an isolation figure-of-merit (IFM) of more than 51 dB in the operating band from 9.95 GHz to 11.73 GHz with a very high peak IFM of 69 dB. The minimum insertion loss in the operating band is 2.73 dB (including losses from the transitions). The isolator measures 33 mm × 8 mm × 0.4 mm. This work introduces an inkjet printed non-planar microwave device which is easy to fabricate showing the ability of inkjet printing for fabricating complex microwave systems. © 2014 IEEE.