An overview of terahertz antennas

• Published in: China communications Vol. 17; no. 7; pp. 124 - 165
• Main Authors: He, Yejun, Chen, Yaling, Zhang, Long, Wong, Sai-Wai, Chen, Zhi Ning
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: China Institute of Communications 01.07.2020; Guangdong Engineering Research Center of Base Station Antennas and Propagation, Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Antennas and Propagation, College of Electronics and Information Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen 518060, China%Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National University of Singapore, 117583, Singapore
• Subjects: Bandwidth; Horn antennas; Microstrip antennas; on-chip antennas; photoconductive antennas; Receiving antennas; technical challenges; THz antennas; Transmitting antennas; Wireless communication; microstrip antennas; THz antennas; horn antennas; photoconductive antennas; on-chip antennas; technical challenges
• ISSN: 1673-5447
• DOI: 10.23919/J.CC.2020.07.011

The terahertz (THz) antennas, which have features of small size, wide frequency bandwidth and high data rate, are important devices for transmitting and receiving THz electromagnetic waves in the emerging THz systems. However, most of THz antennas suffer from relatively high loss and low fabrication precision due to their small sizes in high frequency bands of THz waves. Therefore, this paper presents a detailed overview of the most recent research on the performance improvement of THz antennas. Firstly, the development of THz antennas is briefly reviewed and the basic design ideas of THz antennas are introduced. Then, THz antennas are categorized as metallic antennas, dielectric antennas and new material antennas. After that, the latest research progress in THz photoconductive antennas, THz horn antennas, THz lens antennas, THz microstrip antennas and THz on-chip antennas are discussed. In particular, the practical difficulties for the development of THz antennas are discussed with promising approaches. In addition, this paper also presents a short review of the process technology of THz antennas. Finally, the vital challenges and the future research directions for THz antennas are presented.