Novel Strategies for Efficient Computational Electromagnetic (CEM) Simulation of Microstrip Circuits, Antennas, Arrays and Metamaterials

Part-I: Introduction, Layered Medium Green’s Function, Equivalent Medium Approach

Authors

  • Raj Mittra Department of Electrical & Computer Science, University of Central Florida Orlando, FL, USA
  • Ozlem Ozgun Electrical & Electronics Engineering Department, Hacettepe University Ankara, Turkey
  • Vikrant Kaim Centre for Applied Research in Electronics IIT Delhi, India
  • Abdelkhalek Nasri XLIM Research Institute UMR CNRS 7252, Limoges, France
  • Prashant Chaudhary Department of Electrical & Computer Science, University of Central Florida Orlando, FL, USA
  • Ravi K. Arya Zhongshan Institute of Changchun University of Science and Technology Zhongshan, Guangdong, China

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.13052/2025.ACES.J.400501

Keywords:

5G/6G Communication, Antenna Design, Computational Electromagnetics (CEM), Equivalent Medium Approach (EMA), Layered medium Green’s Functions, Metamaterials, Method of Moments (MoM), Microwave Circuits, Millimeter-Waves

Abstract

Rapid-prototyping plays a critical role in the design of antennas and related planar circuits for wireless communications, especially as we embrace the 5G/6G protocols going forward into the future. While there are a number of software modules commercially available for such rapid prototyping, often they are found to be not as reliable as desired, especially when they are based on approximate equivalent circuit models for various circuit components comprising the antenna system. Consequently, it becomes necessary to resort to the use of more sophisticated simulation techniques, based on full-wave solvers that are numerically rigorous, albeit computer-intensive. Furthermore, optimizing the dimensions of antennas and circuits to enhance the performance of the system is frequently desired, and this often exacerbates the problem since the simulation must be run a large number of times to achieve the performance goal—an optimized design. Consequently, it is highly desirable to develop accurate yet efficient techniques, both in terms of memory requirements and runtimes, to expedite the design process as much as possible. This is especially true when the antenna utilizes metamaterials and metasurfaces for their performance enhancement, as is often the case in modern designs. The purpose of this paper is to present strategies that address the bottlenecks encountered in the generation of Green’s Functions for layered media, especially in the millimeter wave frequency range where the dimensions of the antennas and the platforms upon which they are mounted can be several wavelengths in size.

The paper is divided into two parts. Part-I covers the topics of construction of layered medium Green’s Function for millimeter wavelengths; the Equivalent Medium Approach (EMA) which obviates the need to construct Green’s Function for certain geometries; and the T-matrix approach for hybridizing the finite methods with the Method of Moments(MoM).

In Part-II of this paper, we go on to discuss three other strategies for performance enhancement of CEM techniques: the Characteristic Basis Function Method (CBFM); mesh truncation for finite methods by using a new form of the Perfectly Matched Layer (PML); and GPU acceleration of MoM as well as FDTD (Finite Difference Time Domain) algorithms.

The common theme between the two parts is the “performance enhancement” of CEM (Computational Electromagnetics) techniques, which provides the synergistic link between the two parts.

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Author Biographies

Raj Mittra, Department of Electrical & Computer Science, University of Central Florida Orlando, FL, USA

Raj Mittra is a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the University of Central Florida in Orlando, FL., where he is the Director of the Electromagnetic Communication Laboratory. Before joining the University of Central Florida, he worked at Penn State as a Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering from 1996 through June 2015. He was a Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign from 1957 through 1996, when he moved to Penn State University. Currently, he also holds the position of Hi-Ci Professor at King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia and a Visiting Distinguished Professor in Zhongshan Institute of CUST, China. He is a Life Fellow of the IEEE, a Past-President of AP-S, and has served as the Editor of the Transactions of the Antennas and Propagation Society. He won the Guggenheim Fellowship Award in 1965, the IEEE Centennial Medal in 1984, and the IEEE Millennium Medal in 2000. Other honors include the IEEE/AP-S Distinguished Achievement Award in 2002, the Chen-To Tai Education Award in 2004 and the IEEE Electromagnetics Award in 2006, and the IEEE James H. Mulligan Award in 2011. He has also been recognized by the IEEE with an Alexander Graham Bell award from the IEEE Foundation.

Ozlem Ozgun, Electrical & Electronics Engineering Department, Hacettepe University Ankara, Turkey

Ozlem Ozgun is currently a full professor in the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering at Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey. She received her B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees from Bilkent University and her Ph.D. from Middle East Technical University (METU), all in Electrical and Electronics Engineering. She was a postdoctoral researcher at Penn State University, USA. Her research focuses on computational electromagnetics and radiowave propagation, including numerical methods, domain decomposition, transformation electromagnetics, and stochastic electromagnetic problems. Dr. Ozgun is a Senior Member of IEEE and URSI and a past chair of the URSI Turkey steering committee. She has been selected as a Distinguished Lecturer (DL) by the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society (AP-S) for the period of 2025-2027. Her awards include the METU Best Ph.D. Thesis Award (2007), the Felsen Fund Excellence in Electromagnetics Award (2009), and the IEEE AP-S Outstanding Reviewer Award (2023-2024). She was recognized among the world’s top 2% most influential scientists (Stanford University & Elsevier, 2023–2024) and received the Hacettepe University 2024 Science Award.

Vikrant Kaim, Centre for Applied Research in Electronics IIT Delhi, India

Vikrant Kaim (Member, IEEE) received the Ph.D. degree in electronics and communication from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, India, in 2022. He was a Postdoctoral Fellow with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, from January 2003 to December 2023. In December 2023, he joined the Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering as an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Technology, University of Delhi, Delhi, India. Since Dec. 2024, he has been working as an Assistant Professor at the Centre for Research in Electronics (CARE), Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IIT Delhi). His research interests include applied electromagnetics with focus on bio-electromagnetics and biomedical devices for wearable, implantable and ingestible applications such as wireless power transfer, retinal prosthesis, cardiac implants, and capsule endoscopy. Mr. Kaim was a recipient of the prestigious CSIR Senior Research Fellowship in 2019. He has authored/co-authored 26 publications in reputed international journals and conferences. He is also credited with 3 Indian patents. He is serving as a reviewer for the IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, and IEEE Transactions on BiomedicalEngineering.

Abdelkhalek Nasri, XLIM Research Institute UMR CNRS 7252, Limoges, France

Abdelkhalek Nasri received the B.Sc. degree in electronic systems and the Ph.D. degree in electronics from the Faculty of Sciences of Tunis, Tunisia, in 2011 and 2017, respectively. He is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow at XLIM in Limoges, France. From 2021 to 2022, he was a Research Scholar at the University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL, USA. His research interests include antennas, phased arrays, frequency-selective surfaces, substrate-integrated waveguides, scattering of electromagnetic waves, and bioelectromagnetics.

Prashant Chaudhary, Department of Electrical & Computer Science, University of Central Florida Orlando, FL, USA

Prashant Chaudhary received his B.Sc. (Honors) in Electronics, followed by an M.Sc. in Electronics, and a Ph.D. from the University of Delhi, Delhi, India. He is currently a research assistant in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at the University of Central Florida, USA. His research interests include planar antennas, MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) systems, circularly polarized antennas, 5G communication technology, metasurfaces, magnetic substrates, and metamaterials. He has published over 15 research papers in journals and conferences.

Ravi K. Arya, Zhongshan Institute of Changchun University of Science and Technology Zhongshan, Guangdong, China

Ravi K. Arya is a Distinguished Professor and Director of the Xiangshan Laboratory Wireless Group at the Zhongshan Institute of Changchun University of Science and Technology (ZICUST), China. He earned his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Pennsylvania State University, USA, under the supervision of Prof. Raj Mittra, following an M.Tech in RF and Microwave Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur (advised by Prof. Ramesh Garg) and a B.Tech from Delhi Technological University, India. With a career spanning both academia and industry, Dr. Arya has held positions at ECIL (India), C-DOT (India), Ansys Inc. (USA), and ALL.SPACE (USA), as well as academic roles at NIT Delhi (India) and JNU (India). He has authored over 90 peer-reviewed publications, seven book chapters, and four patents. His research focuses on antenna design, computational electromagnetics, machine learning applications in electromagnetics, and RF system modeling.

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Published

2025-05-30

How to Cite

[1]
R. . Mittra, O. . Ozgun, V. . Kaim, A. . Nasri, P. . Chaudhary, and R. K. . Arya, “Novel Strategies for Efficient Computational Electromagnetic (CEM) Simulation of Microstrip Circuits, Antennas, Arrays and Metamaterials : Part-I: Introduction, Layered Medium Green’s Function, Equivalent Medium Approach”, ACES Journal, vol. 40, no. 05, pp. 373–389, May 2025.

Issue

2025: Vol 40 Iss 5

Section

General Submission