Equivalent-Circuit Models for the Design of Metamaterial

Based on Artificial Magnetic Inclusions

Mu-negative materials: materials with values of the relative permeability

greater than one with negative values of the permeability

mu-near-zero materials: materials with an absolute value of the relative

permeability nearer to zero.

Subwavelength element: the dimensions of and the separation between the

inclusions are small compared to the wavelength. These elements are meant to
manifest the homogeneity with desired medium parameters at the design
frequency. The inclusions react to the impinging magnetic field , the magnetic
response of the artificial material can be expressed in terms of a macroscopic
permeability function.

Such artificial materials are usually obtained at microwaves by printing

suitable metallic resonating inclusions on supporting dielectric boards and
stacking the boards to form a medium.

In most cases, the main reason to employ artificial magnetic

metamaterials in the design of transmissive and radiating microwave
components is related to the possibility of squeezing(reducing) the component
dimensions by using electrically small samples of artificial magnetic materials.

For many of the structures proposed till now, there is no theoretical

limitation for the achievable miniaturization (i.e., the dimensions of the
materials can be, in principle, even infinitesimal), the only intrinsic limit is
represented by the dimensions of the inclusions used to fabricate the needed
metamaterial samples. However, the most common type of resonator used to
achieve anomalous values of the permeability at microwaves, the split-ring
resonator , exhibits a physical dimension of the order of λ/20, which may
represent, thereby, a significant limitation.

In order to overcome this drawback and reduce the dimensions of the

resonant inclusions, multiple split-ring and spiral resonators may be used. With
the use of quasi static analysis, we can extract the equivalent circuit models for
the given structure or inclusion.
 By exploiting the exact circuit models, it is possible to accurately predict
not only the resonant frequency of the individual inclusions, but also their
quality factor and the relative permeability of metamaterial samples made by
given arrangements of such inclusions.

If our design applications are in lower microwave frequency range, it is

proved that quasi static analysis works accurately. As the full wave analysis is
tedious to do and to solve, most of the microwave designers are always happy
with quasi static analysis. Here, the exact circuit models incorporating the
losses will be found with the help of quasi-static analysis.

What is static or quasi-static analysis???

The behavior of a structure at zero frequency is called static behavior. And the
behavior of a structure at greater than zero frequency is called quasi- static
behavior. At very low frequencies lumped elements behaves more as lumped
elements only. But beyond some frequencies where the component size is
comparable to the wavelength its behavior will start behaving in a strange
manner. Example: a capacitor at low frequencies behaves as capacitor only.
But, at microwave frequencies and beyond it will start behaving more like a
inductor due the dominance of lead inductances.

Transmission line parameters for the TEM mode obtained by the static approach
are only valid theoretically at dc. In practice, however, these results can also be
used at higher frequencies. Most engineers want to know up to what frequency
they can use static results. There is no clear-cut answer for this. Some tend to
believe that as long as the frequency is different from zero, static results cannot
be used. On the other hand, most engineers use static results up to frequencies
as high as 18 GHz. In fact, a number of millimeter-wave circuits operating up to
W-band (75–110 GHz) have successfully been designed using only static
results. Nevertheless, at high frequencies, especially those in the millimeter-
wave region, a dynamic approach should be employed for more accurate
determination of the transmission line parameters. The main trade-off between
using static versus dynamic results is that the former is simpler to calculate but
less accurate.
What is full wave analysis or dynamic analysis???

Full wave analysis is to solve the complete set of Maxwells equations for a
given structure without any simplifying assumptions. Usually the fields
described by the equations are time-variant/frequency-dependent. Compared to
full wave analysis are some methods such as Quasi-static analysis, where the
Maxwell's equations are simplified first(the fields are assumed time-
invariant/frequency-independent). The solution found using full wave analysis
is 100% accurate and ideal solution.

Here, quasi-static equivalent-circuit models of different types of following

artificial magnetic resonators or inclusions.

They are:

1. multiple split-ring resonator,

2. Spiral resonator,

3. labyrinth resonator

These 3 types represent popular inclusions to synthesize artificial materials and

metamaterials with anomalous values of the permeability in the microwave and
millimeter-wave frequency ranges.
MULTIPLE SPLIT-RING RESONATOR:
(please replace ‘LR’ with ‘MSRR’ in the equivanlent circuit. It is a mistake)

Fig. 1. (a) Sketch and geometrical dimensions of a multiple split-ring resonator.

(b) Quasi-static equivalent circuit model of the multiple split-ring
resonator depicted in (a).
The magnetic field due to rings have been modelled as
inductor(LMSRR), the conductor losses in that inductor are represented
as RCMSRR , the electric field in between the strips is modelled as
capacitor(CMSRR) and the dielectric losses are represented as RDMSRR.

The lumped equivalent parameters were found from distributed

medium parameters. i.e
Equivalent inductance= (inductance/unit length)* (effective length of
the medium seen by H-field)
Equivalent capacitance= (capacitance/unit length)* (effective length
of the medium seen by E-field).
With this approach the equivalent parameters were found and given as
follows.

Where,

Filling ratio….

The presence of a dielectric substrate, upon which the multiple split-

ring resonator is printed does not affect the inductance.
µ0 – vacuum permeability
l- side length of the external ring
l avg- average strip length calculated over all the N rings
similarly... capacitance can also be defined as follows...

Where,

C0 – per unit length capacitance b/w two parallel strips having width
w and separation s in the presence of a dielectric substrate h and
relative permittivity.
We know that....

And resistance....

By substituting lavg value in resistance expression interms of

inductance.... we get the following expression

Similarly, we can write the expression for RD MSRR as follows.

Rc MSRR- losses in the conductor
R0 – per unit length capacitance
ρ -electrical resistivity of metal
t- thickness of the metallic strip
RD MSRR – shunt resistance represents losses in the dielectric substrate.
RD MSRR is in parallel with the total capacitance Cd MSRR.
Resonant frequency of a multiple split-ring resonator as a function of
the number of rings N is given below after simulating in CST.

***we learn that a few rings are enough to obtain a good reduction of
the resonant frequency, giving a typical miniaturization rate of the
order of λ/40 – λ/50 in the linear dimensions of the inclusion.
2. Spiral resonator:
We will see that Further miniaturization may be obtained by using
spiral resonator.

Fig. 3. (a) Sketch and geometrical dimensions of a spiral resonator.

(b) Quasistatic equivalent circuit model of the spiral resonator
depicted in Fig. 3(a).

The way how we derived the equivalent circuit model for MSRR ... in
the similar manner we derive for spiral resonator. And ... finally those
expressions can be given as follows.
And by simulating the SR structure with different no. Of rings we plot
the following graph.

Resonant frequency of a spiral resonator as a function of the number

of the turns N. Data: `l = 8 mm, w = 0:1 mm, s = 0:1 mm, t = 30 µm,
h = 0:2 mm, " £r= 3:85; tan δ= 0:01; ρc=0:017 . 10 -6m.
***The achievable miniaturization here is of the order of λ/170,
which is a useful result for a lot of interesting applications.

[Link] RESONATOR:

Fig. 5. (a) Sketch and geometrical dimensions of a labyrinth

resonator.
(b) Quasi-static equivalent-circuit model of the labyrinth resonator
depicted
in (a).

But, here, due to multiple splits the gap capacitance became a

considerable component which had been neglected for the previous
structures. So, here, equivalent capacitance will have two components
as follows.
• The first contribution is given by the sum of distributed
capacitance b/w any pair of adjacent rings

• The second contribution, instead, is given by the sum of the

capacitances of the 2N gaps as

Total capacitance is the sum of the above both....

Inductance is given byLLR

Similarly... corresponding to dielectric losses is...

Where...

And .....resistance corresponding to conductor losses....

Resonant frequency of a labyrinth resonator as a function of the gap
length g.
Data: ` l= 5:65 mm, w = 0:9 mm, s = 0:2 mm, t = 30 m,
h = 1:6 mm, £r = 3:85; tan δ= 0:01; ρ = 0:017 10-6 m.

****From the graph we can tell that Labyrinth Resonator

is more suitable at Higher microwave applications because resonant
freq is increasing with gap.

Quality factor:
One of the main issues related to real-life metamaterials is their inherent
narrow bandwidth of operation. The bandwidth of the fabricated metamaterial is
strongly related to the resonance behavior of the inclusions used to implement
the material. Since the resonant behavior of the inclusions can be easily derived
from the accurate resonant equivalent circuits, it is also possible to analytically
express the expected operative bandwidth of a metamaterial made up by a
certain set of inclusions.

A good estimation of the bandwidth may be derived as the inverse of the quality
factor related to the resonance of the individual inclusion. Considering generic
equivalent circuit representations for the inclusions, the quality factor in the
presence of the losses both in the dielectric substrate and metallic conductor can
be written as follows.
 The behavior of the quality factor of individual multiple split-
ring and spiral resonators as a function of the number of rings/turns .
The quality factor is normalized to the one of the split-ring resonator
with the same space occupancy. It is worth noticing that, as expected,
in the cases of multiple split-ring and spiral resonators, the electrically
smaller the inclusions (i.e., the higher the miniaturization rate is), the
higher The Q and the narrower the operation bandwidth of the
metamaterial.

Equivalent-Circuit Model and Permeability Function:

As a first-order approximation, the permeability function is
derived using the Clausius–Mosotti for effective permeability of a
medium densely filled with multiple split-ring, spiral, and labyrinth
resonators is given as follows.

where is the number of inclusions per unit volume and ὰmm is the
magnetic polarizability of the individual magnetic inclusion defined
as

The effective impedance associated to the individual magnetic

inclusion can be determined through the proposed circuits for the
multiple split-ring, spiral, and labyrinth resonator, respectively…

With the help of these expressions we could plot the permeability

function as follows which final goal of this design issue.
 Fig. 9. Relative permeability of a spiral resonator medium as a function of
frequency.
Conclusion:
1. Spiral resonator helps miniaturisation more than MSRR
2. Labyrinth Resonator is more suitable at Higher microwave
applications