Ferroelectric thin films for mobile communication applications
Résumé
The development of mobile communication applications is an important subject matter in the today information society, longing for an ever growing number of services integrated in one single terminal. Miniaturisation and functionalizing of such embarked systems, where volume, weight and energy are limited, hence remains a main research topic on these devices.The traditional microelectronics approach is based on line width reduction by improved photolithographic techniques. In the case of mobile telecommunication applications, where the need of different services imposes multi-standard antennas or the possibility of reconfiguration, miniaturisation due to the employ of new material’s properties is morestriking. Tunability, allowing a number reduction of components, thus is an important research issue.Miniaturisation as well as reconfiguration may be obtained using functional dielectrics, like ferroelectric perovskites, owing to the high-k character and the electrically tuneable permittivity of those materials. The present work reports on the use of BaSrTiO3 thin films, elaborated by chemical solution deposition techniques, for the conception of antennas designed for the UHF television frequency band. The material’s synthesis route is presented, the dielectric properties are discussed, and different telecommunication applications are shown.