Dispersion engineering with resonant-type metamaterial transmission lines

Metamaterial transmission lines are artificial lines consisting on a host conventional line (such as a microstrip or a coplanar waveguide) loaded with reactive elements. The main relevant characteristic of these propagating structures is the fact that, due to the greater number of parameters (as compared to conventional lines), it is possible to tailor (engineer) their dispersion characteristics to achieve certain functionalities not achievable though conventional lines. Enhanced bandwidth components and multiband components are the main benefits of dispersion engineering with metamaterial transmission lines. In this paper, dispersion engineering will be carefully reviewed, and several examples illustrative of the application of this technique to microwave circuit design will be reported. Metamaterial transmission lines are artificial lines consisting on a host conventional line loaded with reactive elements. The main relevant characteristic of these propagating structures is the fact that, due to the greater number of parameters as compared to conventional lines, it is possible to tailor their dispersion characteristics to achieve certain functionalities not achievable though conventional lines. Enhanced bandwidth components and multiband components are the main benefits of dispersion engineering with metamaterial transmission lines. In this paper, dispersion engineering will be carefully reviewed, and several examples illustrative of the application of this technique to microwave circuit design will be given.