Multichroic Bandpass Seashell Antenna with Cold-Electron Bolometers for CMB Measurements

Paper in proceeding, 2016

A novel type of the multichroic "seashell" resonant antenna is developed for CMB measurements. The polarized slot antennas are arranged in the compact form of a seashell with individual slots for each frequency and each polarization. Such an arrangement gives unique opportunity for independent adjusting individual parameters of slots with microstrip lines (MSL) and bolometers. For each frequency band the seashell antenna contains two pairs of orthogonal slots for each polarization connected by microstrip lines (MSL) with a bolometer in the middle for in-phase operation. To fit slots in lambda/2 area for the best beam shape, lumped capacitances in the form of H-slot were introduced. Ellipticity of a beam was improved to the level of better than 1%. The seashell antenna gives a unique opportunity to select needed bandwidth by resonant properties of slots themselves. Slots are phased by MSLs connecting two opposite slots with a resistive Cold-Electron Bolometer (CEB) placed just in middle of two MSLs. MSLs and CEBs are placed just in the area of the seashell antenna. The resonant seashell antenna with CEBs avoids long MSLs bringing signal outside the antenna to large external filters as in the case of sinuous antenna. This innovation avoids losses in long MSLs and increases frequency range.