Broadband Cyclic-Symmetric Magnet-less Circulators and Theoretical Bounds on their Bandwidth

Abstract: In this paper, we explore theoretically and experimentally broadband spatiotemporally modulated (STM) magnet-less circulators realized by combining three-port non-reciprocal junctions with three identical bandpass filters. We develop a rigorous theory for the proposed circuit, which allows to optimize their design and to derive a global bound on the maximum possible bandwidth (BW) for cyclic-symmetric magnetless circulators. We verify our theory with simulations and measurements of a printed circuit board (PCB) prototype based on a differential wye junction and second-order Chebyshev bandpass filters, resulting in a measured fractional BW of 13.9% at a center frequency of 1 GHz.