JOURNAL OF APPLIED PHYSICS 107, 104313 2010

Terahertz antenna based on graphene

M. Dragoman,1,a A. A. Muller,1 D. Dragoman,2 F. Coccetti,3 and R. Plana3
1

National Institute for Research and Development in Microtechnology, IMT, P.O. Box 38-160, 023573 Bucharest, Romania 2 Department of Physics, University of Bucharest, P.O. Box MG-11, 077125 Bucharest, Romania 3 LAAS CNRS, 7 Avenue du Colonel Roche, 31077 Toulouse Cedex 4, France

Received 28 March 2010; accepted 12 April 2010; published online 21 May 2010 We have investigated several congurations of antennas based on graphene. We show that patterned metallic dipole antennas or arrays of dipole antennas deposited on graphene highly benet from the reversible high-resistivity-to-low-resistivity transition in graphene, tuned by a gate voltage. The radiation pattern and the efciency of such antennas are changed via the gate voltage applied on graphene. 2010 American Institute of Physics. doi:10.1063/1.3427536
I. INTRODUCTION

Graphene is a one-atom-thick two-dimensional carbon crystal retrieved in many materials such as HOPG highly ordered pyrolytic graphite, which consists of many graphene sheets stacked in a pile, or carbon nanotubes, formed from one or more rolled-up graphene layers. Graphene is usually produced by mechanical exfoliation of HOPG followed by deposition with a scotch tape on a SiO2 layer grown on a doped Si substrate. This method is able to fabricate graphene with features up to few millimeters.1 Also, graphene is produced by epitaxial techniques on a SiC substrate with dimensions of few inches.2 Graphene has many astonishing properties, such as carrier mobility attaining 200 000 cm2 V1 s1 at room temperature and a Young modulus of 1.5 TPa, which renders graphene the stiffest material with the highest mobility. The fabrication methods and the physical properties of graphene are recently reviewed in Ref. 3. Since the graphene ake is big enough to support a series of metal electrodes on it, it could be possible to pattern an array of antennas over graphene. What could be the benet of such an antenna? The graphene has a variable resistivity, which is rapidly decreasing as the gate voltage increases from 0 up to 1015 V. We demonstrate in this paper, by numerical simulations, that the gain of an antenna patterned on graphene can be enabled or disabled by tuning the gate voltage, and that the shape of the radiation pattern of an antenna array can be modied by individually controlled gates that act on each antenna. In this way, the pattern of an antenna array could be changed only by the gate voltage variation. This is in deep contrast with any other type of antenna arrays, where the radiation pattern is modied by switches or phase shifters. Of course, the pattern changes of antennas via tuning of the graphene conductance is valid for antennas working at very high frequencies, because the length of antenna / 2 should t the relative small area of graphene. Therefore, terahertz THz frequencies are suitable for antennas with a length of few hundred microns. Morea

over, the absorption in graphene at THz frequencies is relatively low and given by A = = 2.293%, where A is the absorbance and = e2 / c is the ne structure constant in cgs units.4 The contributions of various factors decrease this absorbance value in the THz region with approximately 2%.5
II. A SINGLE THZ ANTENNA DIPOLE BASED ON GRAPHENE

A dipole antenna made by gold deposition on a graphene layer placed or grown over a SiO2 / Si substrate is displayed in Fig. 1. The thickness of gold deposition is 2 m and the SiO2 layer is 300 nm thick, the last value remaining the same for all simulations reported in this paper. The dimensions of the dipole are W = 100 m, L = 1000 m, g = 50 m, and the antenna works at 120 GHz, or 0.12 THz. We use in calculations two typical values of graphene resistivity, of 0.15 cm at VG = 0 V and 105 cm at VG = 15 V,6 and denote these states by ON and OFF, respectively. The antenna in Fig. 1 was simulated with the software IE3D and the antenna main parameters were found in both ON and OFF states of graphene. The permittivity of the graphene sheet is r = 5.7 In Fig. 2 we have displayed the radiation pattern of the graphene dipole antenna in the two states. We see that in the OFF state the pattern is suppressed, while in the ON state, the gain at 120 GHz is 1 dBi, the directivity is 2.18 dBi

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. Electronic addresses: mircea.dragoman@imt.ro and mdragoman@yahoo.com. 107, 104313-1

FIG. 1. A dipole antenna on graphene at 120 GHz. 2010 American Institute of Physics

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FIG. 2. The radiation pattern of the dipole antenna on graphene in the ON and OFF states at 120 GHz.

FIG. 4. The radiation pattern of the dipole antenna on graphene in the ON and OFF states at 1.05 THz.

and the radiation efciency is 94.61%. So, the dipole antenna on graphene works quite good at 120 GHz in the ON state, the most important result being that the radiation pattern can be switched depending on the gate voltage. This property will be further exploited to shape the radiation pattern in an array by switching on and off, via gate voltages, various dipole antennas. Before this, however, we study a similar dipole but working at a much higher frequency, of 1.05 THz, in order to verify if the performances described above are preserved at THz range. In this case, the graphene dipole antenna has the following dimensions: L = 120 m, W = 100 m, and g = 10 m. The graphene substrate is the same as in the case of the antenna working at 120 GHz, i.e., 300 nm SiO2 deposited over a Si substrate. The graphene THz antenna gold deposition is this time 1 m. Using the same simulation software, we have found that at 1.05 THz

the gain is 2.72 dBi, the radiation efciency is 95.80%, and the antenna efciency is 89.14%. The real and imaginary parts of the impedance of the THz graphene antenna are displayed in Fig. 3. The real part of the impedance is around 50 , while the imaginary part is almost constant, and thus can be easily matched. The radiation pattern is displayed in Fig. 4 in both ON and OFF states. Again, the radiation pattern is switched on and off by the two states of resistivity in two applied gate voltages on graphene. The difference between the two radiation patterns is huge, i.e., while in the ON state the antenna has a gain of 2.72 dBi, in the OFF state the gain is only 43 dBi at the maximum radiation direction = 0 0 .

FIG. 3. The real and imaginary impedance of the dipole antenna on graphene working at 1.05 THz.

FIG. 5. The dipole antenna array on graphene working at 1.05 THz.

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FIG. 6. Color online The radiation pattern of the antenna array when all antennas are in the ON state.

FIG. 7. Color online The radiation pattern of the antenna array when lines 1 and 4 are in the OFF state and all other antennas are in the ON state.

III. THZ DIPOLE ANTENNA ARRAYS BASED ON GRAPHENE

displayed in Fig. 7. Now, the antenna array has a single main beam with a gain of 10 dBi, while the lateral lobes are drastically reduced in comparison to Fig. 6.
IV. CONCLUSIONS

We will further consider the THz dipole antenna array formed by 4 4 identical dipoles, which work at 1.05 THz, as described in Sec. II see Fig. 5. We have chosen dx = 60 m and dy = 40 m, and have considered that each antenna is connected to a top gate, such that each antenna could be programmed in an ON or OFF state. Such a top gate is typical for graphene eld effect transistors see, for example, Ref. 1. We have recently found an inexpensive technology in which the gate electrode is isolated from graphene by a poly methyl methacrylate layer with a thickness of 100 nm. The technology of fabrication of such gates is extensively described in Ref. 8. When all antennas in the array are in the ON state, the radiation pattern is displayed in Fig. 6. Although the gain is 13.9 dBi, the antenna array contains lateral lobes, which could produce distortions when the antenna array is used to radiate THz signals. So, we are looking for a radiation pattern where the lateral lobes are signicantly reduced. Therefore, if we put the lines 1 and 4 of the array in the OFF state, the radiation pattern is strongly modied, as

We have shown that antennas on graphene at THz frequencies display good values of gain and antenna and radiation efciencies. The possibility to control the antennas in an array using the high and low resistivity states of graphene via back or top gates allow us to implement desired radiation patterns with reduced lateral lobes, such that the THz electromagnetic energy is concentrated in a single main lobe.
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