Design and Simulation of a Multilayer Dual Behavior

Resonator Microwave Filter

Carlos Andrs Viteri Mera1, Juan Carlos Bohrquez Reyes2
Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department
Universidad de los Andes
Bogot, Colombia
1
caviteri@egresados.uniandes.edu.co; 2jubohorq@uniandes.edu.co

AbstractThis article presents the design and simulation of a

fourth order multilayer Dual Behavior Resonator (DBR)
microwave filter. As a first step, a single layer filter design is
made, based on open-circuited different-length stubs DBR
structures. A two layer filter is obtained by modifying the initial
design, allowing cross-couplings between non-adjacent
resonators. The multilayer configuration reduces the circuit size,
and has the potential to improve the filters electrical response. A
comparison between the single layer and the multilayer designs is
provided.
Keywords- filter synthesis; microstrip technology; microwave
bandpass filter; open-ended stubs.

I.

INTRODUCTION

Dual Behavior Resonator (DBR) technology has been

receiving increasing attention from researchers in recent years,
due to its applications in planar microwave filters [1][11]. In
this paper, we present a multilayer DBR microwave filter
design process, based in the work described in [12]. Our goal is
to use open-circuited different-length microstrip stubs to
construct a single layer filter, and use this design in a later stage
to implement a multilayer filter.
Multilayer planar structures have significant advantages
over the single layer ones. For example, they allow a
considerable reduction in components size, which is one of the
main characteristics the market is demanding in microwave
devices. In addition, multilayer technology permits new forms
of electromagnetic coupling within microwave circuits, helping
to improve their performance.
Despite the fact that multilayer technology has several
advantages, it requires a demanding design and implementation
process. In this paper, a single layer filter is used as the first
step to obtain a multilayer filter. Thus, the complexity of a
direct multilayer filter synthesis is reduced.
This document is organized as follows. In Section II, the
fundamentals of the DBR technology, its microstrip
implementation and the fourth order filter synthesis procedure
are presented. Section III describes the design of a single layer
DBR microwave filter, along with its simulation and
implementation results. Section IV shows the DBR multilayer
filter design, the simulation results, and the comparison
between the single layer and multilayer prototypes. Finally,
conclusions and future work directions are given.

II.

OPEN-CIRCUITED DIFFERENT-LENGTH STUBS DBR

STRUCTURES

A. The DBR concept

Fig. 1 shows the basic DBR structure, which is created
using two resonant elements, with impedances Z1 and Z 2 , in
shunt configuration. This arrangement has a total impedance

Z=

Z1 Z 2 .
Z1 + Z 2

(1)

Thus, the DBR can be configured with two transmission

zeros at the frequencies where Z1 = 0 and Z 2 = 0 . Moreover,
it has one resonant frequency where the total impedance tends
towards infinite in Z1 + Z 2 = 0 . This configuration is suitable
for building bandpass filters, considering that transmission
zeros can be placed in the sidebands of the resonant frequency,
in order to achieve high rejection [1][3].
B. Use of open-circuited different-length stubs in a DBR
The configuration shown in Fig.1 can be implemented in
microstrip technology using stubs with different lengths,
impedances and terminations.
Open-circuited microstrip stubs in shunt configuration are
used in this work, which individually are bandstop resonant
structures when they have a r 4 length. The input impedance
of this kind of stubs is

Z stub =

jZ line

tan r
2

(2)

where Z line is the characteristic impedance of the line, is the

wavelength of the input signal, and r is the wavelength at the
desired resonant frequency (which makes Z stub = 0 ) [13].
According to (2), the impedances Z1 and Z 2 of the DBR
structure can be implemented using this open-circuited
microstrip stubs.

Open circuited stub 1

Length: r1 / 4
Impedance: Z C1

Z1 Z 2

Figure 1. DBR configuration.

50 Access

Fig. 2 shows a microstrip DBR configuration using 50

access lines. r1 and r 2 are the wavelengths at the
frequencies where transmission zeros are configured. Z C1 and
Z C 2 are the characteristic impedances of each stub, which are
controlled varying the line width.
C. Fourth order DBR filter synthesis
We used the filter synthesis procedure defined in [2] to
design a fourth order DBR filter, taking into account the
configuration shown in Fig. 1. Four identical DBRs are coupled
together using admittance inverters, which are designed based
on two parameters: the fractional bandwidth w and the
susceptance slope parameter b . Fig.3 shows the filter model.
The admittance inverters are implemented in the form of
one quarter wavelength microstrip sections, which connect the
DBRs. The impedances of these sections are calculated using

Z i ,i +1

Z
= 0 ,
J i ,i +1

(3)

50 Access

Open circuited stub 2

Length: r 2 / 4
Impedance: Z C 2

Port 1

Port 2

Figure 2. Microstrip implementation of a DBR.

Z0

J 0,1

J1, 2

J 2,3

J 3, 4

J 4,5

Z0

Figure 3. Fourth order DBR filter model.

Hence, if the lower transmission zero is at frequency f1

and the higher transmission zero is at frequency f 2 (with
associated wavelengths r1 and r 2 respectively), the stubs
which constitute the DBR must have l1 = r1 4 and
l2 = r 2 4 lengths.
The analytic expressions for the stubs characteristic
impedances are derived from (1) and (2) and the condition
Z1 + Z 2 = 0 . The following expressions are adapted from [1],
[2] and [7]:

with

J 0,1 =

J j , j +1 =

J 4,5 =

GA b w
g 0 g1 w1

(4)

wb

(5)

w1 g j g j +1

GB b w
g 4 g 5 w1

where Z 0 is the desired characteristic impedance

design), G A and G B are the normalized
conductances of the circuit (with a value of
terminations are adapted loads), the g i s are

Z C1 = Z C 2

ZC2 = Z0
(6)
(50 in our
terminating
1 when the
the lowpass

prototype coefficients (Chebyshev), and w1 is the normalized

cutoff frequency of the low-pass prototype (a value of 1 was
used) [14]. The length of the inverters is one quarter
wavelength at the desired central frequency (i.e. 0 4 ).
The DBR structures must have one quarter wavelength at
the desired stop frequencies (one larger and one smaller than
the central frequency), which must be configured near the
passband.

tan 2

tan 2

l1

0
l
2
0

(7)

(R S )

(8)

with

R=

l2
l
1 + tan 2 2 2
0
0

tan 2

l1
l1
2
1 + tan 2
S=
0
0

tan 2

(9)

l2

0
l
1
0

(10)

With these expressions, the designer is able to calculate the

dimensions of the fourth order microstrip DBR filter. Fig. 4
shows the configuration of such device. The line widths in the

figure are not scaled, and are only an illustration of the

impedances that should be calculated in the real design.
III.

FOURTH ORDER MICROSTRIP DBR FILTER

A. Design of the prototype

As a first step towards the implementation of a multilayer
DBR filter, a single layer prototype is designed based on the
procedure described in Section II. TABLE I. shows the input
parameters that were used in order to synthesize the microstrip
dimensions of a fourth order DBR filter (based on (3) (10)).

Open circuited stubs

Length: r1 / 4
Impedance: Z C1

Low frequency
resonators

50 Access

50 Access
Inverter 0,1

Inverter 1,2

Inverter 4,5

Inverter 3,4

Inverter 2,3

Open circuited stubs

Length: r 2 / 4
Impedance: Z C 2

High frequency
resonators

Figure 4. Fourth order DBR filter model in microstrip technology.

INPUT PARAMETERS FOR THE DBR SINGLE LAYER FILTER
Center frequency

f0

Fractional bandwidth

1 GHz

Susceptance slope parameter

-20

Low resonant frequency

f1

0.7 GHz

High resonant frequency

f2

1.3 GHz

Characteristic impedance

Z0

50

Standard FR4 substrate was used for this design ( R = 4.4

and h = 1.575 mm ). The low and high resonant frequencies and
the susceptance slope parameter for the DBRs were selected in
such a way that the resulting impedances could be easily
implemented.
After applying equations (3)(10), the microstrip prototype
dimensions were calculated for the selected substrate. The
resulting circuit was simulated using Ansoft HFSS, and the
microstrip line dimensions were corrected in order to better
approximate the desired performance. The resulting dimensions
of the synthesis process are shown in TABLE II.
B. Results
The resulting single layer filter design was implemented in
the FR4 substrate using the obtained prototype dimensions.
Fig. 5 shows simulation and measurement results for the S
parameters of the filter.
The measured central frequency was 990 MHz, and the
fractional bandwidth was 20.3%, with insertion losses of 2.65
dB. Technological defaults were the main cause of the
differences between the input parameters of the design and the
measured results.
IV.

15%

MULTILAYER FILTER DESIGN

A. Principle
The use of the multilayer technology for this filter has two
important advantages: the circuits size reduction and the
possibility of create electromagnetic couplings between non
adjacent resonators (DBRs). Fig. 6 illustrates the concept of
this electromagnetic coupling applied to the fourth order filter
[12].

S11 and S21 [dB]

TABLE I.

f0

-40
-60

Measured S

-80
-100

21

Measured S11
Simulated S21
f1

f2

1.4
1.2
1
Frequency [GHz]

0.8

0.6

0.4

Simulated S11

1.8

1.6

Figure 5. Simulated and measured electrical response of the fourth order

DBR filter model in single layer microstrip technology.

J1,3
Z0

J 0,1

J1, 2

J 2,3

J 3, 4

J 4,5

Z0

J 2, 4
Figure 6. Coupling between non-adjacent resonators [12].

TABLE II.

OUTPUT PARAMETERS AND DIMENSIONS OF THE DBR SINGLE

LAYER FILTER

Impedance
()

Width
(mm)

Length
(mm)

Low frequency resonators

42.9

3.7

58.1

High frequency resonators

92.6

0.8

33

Admitance inverters 0,1 and 4,5

40.8

40.3

Admitance inverters 1,2 and 3,4

38.5

4.35

40.3

Admitance inverter 2,3

52.6

2.65

41.25

Section

B. Multilayer DBR filter

The filter developed in Section IV was modified into a two
layer structure, based in the work presented in [12]. Fig. 7
shows the resulting configuration.

The 50 accesses, admittance inverters (0,1) and (4,5), and

DBRs 1 and 4 are placed in the first layer (gray in Fig. 7).
DBRs 2 and 3, and admittance inverters (1,2), (2,3), and (3,4)
are in the upper layer (black in Fig.7). A ground plane is at the
bottom of this circuit.
The microstrip sections are folded in order to reduce the
circuit size and allow the electromagnetic coupling between
DBRs. In this case, the high frequency stubs of DBRs 2 and 3
are positioned parallel with respect to the low frequency stubs
of DBRs 1 and 4 (this is highlighted with the dotted boxes in
Fig. 7). This coupling occurs between resonators in different
layers (i.e. separated by a dielectric layer). In this way,
configuration of Fig. 6 is obtained for the multilayer filter. The
couplings are controlled with the distance between the parallel
microstrip structures and its length.
The substrate used in this case was changed to FR4 with

R = 4.4 and h = 0.5 mm for each layer. For this reason, we

corrected the microstrip physical lengths and widths, according
to the values in TABLE III.

Figure 7. The fourth order multilayer DBR filter.

The configuration of the inter-layer electromagnetic

coupling between resonators (length and distance between
stubs) was performed using parametric simulation. Corrections
were introduced to the impedances of admittance inverters and
resonators, due to the new couplings in the multilayer design.

An important size reduction of nearly 40% was achieved.

The single layer circuit has an area of 91.1 202.45 mm2,
while the multilayer configuration has 103.2 113 mm2.
The simulation shows that multilayer filter performance can
be improved if the cross-coupling between non-adjacent
resonators is characterized and proper values for its coefficient
are chosen.

-20

S11 and S21 [dB]

C. Results
Fig. 8 shows the simulation comparison between multilayer
and single layer filters. The central frequency of the multilayer
configuration was 983 MHz with fractional bandwidth of
22.07% and insertion losses of 2.3 dB.

f0

-40
-60

Single layer S11

Single layer S21

-80
-100

Multilayer S11

f1

0.4

0.6

Multilayer S21

0.8

1
1.2
1.4
Frequency [GHz]

1.6

1.8

Figure 8. Electrical responses of the single layer and the multilayer filters.

TABLE III.

OUTPUT PARAMETERS AND DIMENSIONS OF THE DBR SINGLE

LAYER FILTER

V.

CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE WORK

The design procedure of the single layer DBR filter was

performed in a rather simple way. Simulations showed the
flexibility of the design, taking into account that physical
dimensions reflect directly in the electrical response of the
filter.
Multilayer configuration was achieved by correcting the
single layer filter physical dimensions according to the new
substrate. A size reduction of nearly 40% was achieved with
respect to the single layer filter.
Electromagnetic coupling between non-adjacent resonators
was achieved in the multilayer filter. A characterization of this
coupling must be done in the future in order to improve the
sideband rejection and the achievable fractional bandwidth of
the multilayer filter.

Section

Low frequency resonators

(upper layer)
High frequency resonators
(upper layer)
Low frequency resonators
(first layer)
High frequency resonators
(first layer)
Admitance inverters 0,1 and 4,5
(first layer)
Admitance inverters 1,2 and 3,4
(upper layer)
Admitance inverter 2,3
(upper layer)

Impedance
()

Width
(mm)

Length
(mm)

40.4

2.4

58.2

97.4

0.55

33.1

40.4

1.2

51

97.4

0.3

27.4

40.7

0.8

35.7

38.4

1.5

41.6

57.5

0.45

42.6

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