A New Measurement Technique on Inherent-Ring-Resonance Frequency and Effective Loss-Tangent using Ring Filters

As an application of ring filters, a new and simple method to determine an inherent-ring-resonance frequency is introduced. The ring filter consists of a ring and two short stubs. They are connected at 90$^{\circ}$ and 270$^{\circ}$ points of the ring and the ring filter may be seen in such way that two filters are connected in parallel. Therefore, if the two powers of the two filters are out-of-phase at the output, the power excited at the input can not be delivered. That can be done by making difference in length of the two short stubs, and when a certain condition is satisfied, a frequency exists where all the excited power is reflected. That is the very inherent-ring-resonance frequency. In the lossless case, the return loss with the condition reaches 0 dB at the inherent-ring-resonance frequency but does not with conductor, dielectric losses and so on. Therefore, the effective loss tangent at a frequency of interest may be obtained correctly. To verify the method, two ring filters have been fabricated in microstrip lines and the measured results show good agreement with the predicted ones.