Flexible and Efficient Computer-Aided Design Tool for Advanced Comb-Line Rectangular Waveguide Filters

Abstract

A very flexible and efficient computer-aided design (CAD) tool, specifically suited for advanced comb-line rectangular waveguide filters, is presented in this work. The developed software tool, which makes use of a full-wave analysis technique based on the Boundary Integral - Resonant Mode Expansion method, permits to load the considered comb-line resonators with any number of radially symmetrical partial-height metallic posts. The implemented CAD tool also allows for dealing with coupling windows of arbitrary cross-section, thus drastically enhancing the flexibility of the computer-aided design process. The excitation of the analyzed components, which is performed by using generalized coaxial probes, has also been integrated in the implemented software tool, thus achieving a full-wave electromagnetic characterization of the whole component. Furthermore, a novel simple procedure to efficiently connect all the obtained wide-band matrices is proposed. In order to validate the accuracy and efficiency of this novel CAD tool, several new designs concerning advanced band-pass comb-line waveguide filters are presented. The accuracy of the developed CAD tool has been successfully validated by comparing the obtained results with numerical data provided by a commercial tool based on the finite-element method