ED URE

S
U AT
C
FO E FE
SU
S
I

ue to the enormous advances made in

semiconductor technology over the
last few years, high integration densities with moderate costs are achievable even in the millimeter-wave
(mm-wave) range and beyond, which encourage the

development of imaging systems with a high number

of channels. The mm-wave range lies between 30 and
300 GHz, with corresponding wavelengths between
10 and 1 mm. While imaging objects with signals
of a few millimeters in wavelength, many optically
opaque objects appear transparent, making mm-wave

Sherif Sayed Ahmed (sherif-sayed.ahmed@rohde-schwarz.com), Andreas Schiessl, and Frank Gumbmann are with
Rohde & Schwarz GmbH & Co. KG, Munich, Germany. Marc Tiebout is with Infineon Technologies, Villach, Austria.
Sebastian Methfessel and Lorenz-Peter Schmidt are with the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MMM.2012.2205772
Date of publication: 13 September 2012

26

1527-3342/12/$31.002012IEEE

September/October 2012

Sherif Sayed Ahmed, Andreas Schiessl,

Frank Gumbmann, Marc Tiebout, Sebastian Methfessel,
and Lorenz-Peter Schmidt

imaging attractive for a wide variety of commercial

and scientific applications like nondestructive testing
(NDT), material characterization, security scanning,
and medical screening. The spatial resolution in lateral and range directions as well as the image dynamic
range offered by an imaging system are considered
the main measures of performance. With the availability of more channels combined with the powerful
digital signal processing (DSP) capabilities of modern
computers, the performance of mm-wave imaging systems is advancing rapidly.
The most commonly known imaging systems are
based on X-ray technology, which are applied in,
e.g., computed tomography (CT) for medical diagnostics [1], NDT applications [2], and luggage inspection at security checkpoints. These systems work in
a transmission setup. Furthermore, backscatter X-ray
systems, which work in a reflection setup, were investigated over the last years, especially for the screening
of passengers for concealed objects at airports [3]. On
the one hand, X-ray images have an inherent high lateral resolution due to the extremely short wavelength
(m ~ 10 2nm 10nm). But on the other hand, the energy
of the photons is high enough to ionize organic and
inorganic matter. Therefore, health aspects are critical
with respect to imaging of humans, especially in the
case of personnel screening at airports.
Another well-known imaging technology is the
ultrasonic inspection of materials for NDT applications [4] and screening of humans for medical diagnostics [5]. Depending on the medium of propagation,
a lateral resolution even in the submillimeter region
is achievable. However, for most ultrasonic devices, an
appropriate coupling medium is required for an efficient coupling of the ultrasonic wave in the respective
device under test (DUT).
In contrast, electromagnetic mm-waves offer a
contactless inspection of materials with nonionizing
radiation and a high spatial resolution. Since spatial resolution and penetration depth are conflicting
parameters regarding the wavelength, e.g., the E-band
(6090 GHz with m = 5 to 3.3 mm) is a good compromise for NDT applications to detect flaws, material
inhomogeneities, and inclusions in dielectrics. A lateral resolution of ~2 mm is sufficient for many applications, e.g., the personnel screening at airport security

September/October 2012

checkpoints. Furthermore, it is possible to exploit the

vectorial nature of electromagnetic waves and to carry
out polarimetric measurements [6]. This offers the
potential of classification of different scattering processes [7] and thus an improved detection of anomalies in the DUT is possible.
The mm-wave images can be generated by either a
passive or an active imaging approach. Passive imaging systems detect the characteristic radiation of an
object and the reflected background radiation without the need of illuminating the DUT with additional
electromagnetic energy. Thus a passive mm-wave
image contains the information of the emissivity and
reflectivity of an object in the respective frequency
domain [8], [9]. Especially for outdoor applications,
this technique offers a high radiometric contrast with
respect to the emissivity of the imaged object due
to the low background radiation temperature (Tsky)
of the sky, i.e., in mm-wave range the clear sky has
Tsky 1 100 K. However, passive imaging systems suffer from low radiometric contrast in indoor applications due to the high background temperature of the
environment. This can be solved by applying cooled
detectors to achieve a high radiometric sensitivity
[10] or by using a noise source as an illuminator [11].
Another drawback is the lack of depth information
concerning the investigated DUT. This results from
the fact that the detected signals can be understood
as thermal noise and thus the radiation is incoherent. On the contrary, active imaging systems illuminate the DUT and the reflected or transmitted field
can be detected coherently or incoherently. For many
applications, active imaging is necessary to achieve
an image with high dynamic range and radiometric
contrast. Regarding a transmission setup, the attenuation and absorption through a dielectric specimen
can be mapped, while for a reflection setup, the
object reflectivity can be characterized. In the case
of spatially smooth objects relative to the applied
wavelength, the scattering process is dominated by
specular reflections [12]. Therefore, the visibility of
the DUT and the image quality depends on an appropriate illumination of the specimen and a proper
positioning of the antennas.
By applying a coherent broadband transmit and
receive signal or, equivalently, a time delay measurement

27

With the availability of more

channels combined with the DSP
capabilities of modern computers,
the performance of mm-wave
imaging systems is advancing
rapidly.
in active imaging, it is additionally possible to reconstruct
the spatial extend of the DUT along the range direction.
With a sufficiently large signal bandwidth, it is furthermore possible to analyze multiple reflections resulting
from a stratified dielectric medium. This information
can be used for instance to investigate delamination for
NDT applications [13] or to identify explosive sheets or
other concealed objects for personnel screening applications [14], [15]. The last named application requires a
reflection setup since the human body is not transparent
in the mm-wave region with the penetration depth of
human skin in the range of submillimeters. Due to the
high water content of the human skin, it behaves as a
strong reflector for mm-wave signals. Thus, the reflection imagery is dominated by the specular reflections,
making active imaging on large distance inappropriate.
Therefore, close-range imaging is necessary, which consequently increases the complexity regarding the image
formation with respect to the conventional imaging
under far-field conditions.

Image Formation
For many NDT applications and especially for personnel screening, a reflection setup is necessary. To
accomplish a three-dimensional (3-D) reconstruction
of the DUT, a two-dimensional (2-D) aperture has to
be sampled with a broadband measurement signal at
each selected transmit-receive combination. The spatial extension of the aperture determines the lateral
resolution dx,y, given approximately by
d x, y . m L ,
D x, y

(1)

where Dx,y denotes the length of the aperture in the

corresponding direction, m the wavelength, and L the
distance between object and aperture [16], [17]. The
resolution dz in range direction is determined approximately by the signal bandwidth B of the measured RF
signal [16], [17], thus given by
dz .

c0
.
2B

(2)

Accordingly, a large signal bandwidth B results

in an equivalent short pulse duration and hence in a
high range resolution. This is for example interesting
for monitoring delamination effects in NDT or the
detection of thin dielectric explosive sheets in person-

28

nel screening. In practice, the bandwidth is often limited by the employed semiconductor components, e.g.,
oscillators, mixers, and amplifiers.
Depending on the field of application, the spatial
sampling can be realized with mechanical scanning
techniques [18][20] or electronic sampling by switching between spatially distributed transmit and receive
antennas [21][23]. If real-time imaging is required,
electronic sampling with parallelized data acquisition is necessary, which leads consequently to a higher
hardware complexity. A compromise between measurement speed and technical complexity is a hybrid
concept with mechanical sampling in one spatial coordinate and electronic sampling in the perpendicular
direction [24][26]. This is an appropriate approach
to inspect goods on a conveyor belt and offers also a
flexible choice of the imaging aperture (planar, cylindrical, etc.) with respect to the mechanical sampling
coordinate. Thus, an adaption of the imaging aperture
to the target geometry is possible, which results in an
improved target illumination [12].
High lateral resolution results from a large aperture dimension D as denoted in (1). This can be accomplished by hardware focusing with elliptic mirrors,
dielectric lenses, reflect arrays or antenna arrays with
hardware beamforming (HBF). No necessary image
formation has to be applied when the mm-wave image
is generated by focusing with mirrors and lenses.
However, these devices offer optimum resolution only
at the focal point [27]. Reflect arrays are planar devices
with a spatial distribution of adjustable reflective elements, which can be either continuous or binary modulated components [28]. If the spatial reflectivity over
the reflector can be electrically tuned, it is also possible to steer the resulting focal point in three dimensions [21]. This approach is, however, limited by the
low bandwidth of the reflective elements of the reflect
array, which results in a poor range resolution. An
image with high dynamic range requires furthermore
a dense placement of these reflective elements which
is hardly achievable for large reflect arrays in the mmwave range.
Another approach that enables a flexible steering of
the focal point is by individual control of the transmit
and receive antennas in the imaging array. The idea is
to weight the respective antenna elements by a proper
phase and magnitude factors to steer the electromagnetic wave in the desired direction. This can be accomplished either with hardware- or digital-beamforming
(DBF), as illustrated in Figures 1 and 2, respectively.
HBF, however needs no post processing to focus the
image, requires essentially an exact knowledge about
the transfer functions of all transmit and receive antennas, which have to be compensated by the respective
phase shifter and gain control. This requirement is
also hardly achievable for large imaging arrays and
hence practically limits the system performance.

September/October 2012

The most flexible approach is the DBF which is also

well known as aperture synthesis. The reflected signal is coherently detected at every receive antenna,
digitized and stored. After compensating for the influence of the transmit/receive transfer functions by a
proper calibration procedure, the data are weighted
by complex correction factors, in order to exclude the
free space transfer function, and coherently sum the
recorded reflections to form the focused radar image.
In literature, this numerical procedure is named variously as DBF, aperture synthesis, back-propagation,
back-projection or migration technique [29][31]. In
contrast to HBF, several mm-wave images can be generated with the same raw data set. This is interesting
when different amplitude weighting is applied to the
raw data in order to generate images of different features addressing, e.g., optimum spatial resolution or
enhanced image dynamic range.
This high level of flexibility made by the DBF comes
at the cost of the intensive signal processing involved,
which therefore often forms the bottleneck of the
system performance. The image frame rate achieved
by a mm-wave imaging system is as well a considerable performance criterion for many applications. It is
determined by both, the measurement and the image
formation speed, which strongly depends on system
topology. In HBF systems, measurement time is proportional to the number of scanned voxels and the
measurement time per voxel, which is connected to
the intermediate frequency (IF) bandwidth and the
switching speed of the system. In DBF systems with
parallel acquisition at the receivers, measurement time
is determined by the number of sequential transmitter
measurements, the RF bandwidth, the required unambiguous range, the transmitter switching speed, and
IF bandwidth. With mechanically scanning systems,
measurement time will be also limited by the achievable scan speed while taking the required accuracy
of the antenna positioning into account. The achievable image formation speed in a DBF system depends
mainly on the resolution of the image, the number of
collected measurements, and the complexity of the
underlying image formation algorithm. DSP units
thus govern the speed of image formation, whereas
they are continuously offering higher clocks and more
parallelization on their processing cores making DBF
solutions more applicable.
The sampling of the 2-D aperture can be accomplished by a monostatic or a multistatic arrangement
of the transmit and receive antennas. In a monostatic
setup, each antenna element in the imaging aperture
transmit and receive at the same position. The DUT is
sequentially illuminated from every antenna element.
The benefit of this approach is that only one transmit/
receive channel is required if the aperture is sampled
mechanically (see Figure 3). Electronic switching
between a higher number of transmit/receive elements

September/October 2012

Electromagnetic mm-waves offer a

contactless inspection of materials
with nonionizing radiation and a
high spatial resolution.

Antenna Array
Phase Shifter
Variable Gain

Power Combiner

Digitalization

A /D

Figure 1. Hardware architecture of receive path for

hardware-beamforming imagers.

Antenna Array
Fixed Gain
A /D

Digitalization

A /D

A /D

A /D

Memory

Image Formation

Digital Signal Processing

Figure 2. Hardware architecture of receive path for DBF

imagers.

Transmit/Receive
Antenna

y
rA
z
r
x
DUT

Figure 3. Geometry definition for monostatic imaging. The

green lines show an example path for mechanical scanning.

29

A multistatic arrangement samples

the aperture by spatially distributed
multiple transmit and receive
antennas.
is possible to improve the data acquisition speed, however this leads to an enormous number of channels.
If the compensation of the free space attenuation is
neglected, the focusing in a monostatic arrangement
can be formulated as
o (yr) = / / s (vrA , ~) e j2 c0 R,
~

(3)

N~ N A

where s (vrA , ~) denotes the received complex signal at

location vrA and angular frequency ~, and o (vr) is the
desired reflectivity distribution of the DUT. R = ; vrA - vr ;
is the distance between the position vrA of the respective antenna element and the position vr of the desired
voxel position. For DBF, there exist several concepts
for an efficient numerical implementation of the above
formula. The most popular approach is the reconstruction in the Fourier domain [32][34], which benefits
from the fast Fourier transformation (FFT). There are
also concepts for multilevel based reconstructions [35],
[36], which were adapted from the field of numerical
electromagnetics [37].
A multistatic arrangement samples the aperture
by spatially distributed multiple transmit and receive
antennas [22], [23], [25], [26]. The DUT is again sequentially illuminated by the transmit antennas however the reflected electromagnetic field is coherently
detected by every receive antenna. Accordingly, the
total number of channels can be drastically reduced,
while collecting the same number of measurements

Transmit Antenna
Receive Antenna

rT

rR

z
r
x
DUT

Figure 4. Geometry definition for multistatic imaging.

The distribution of the transmit and receive antennas are
selected differently.

30

made by an equivalent monostatic array. In addition, a

multistatic approach offers the opportunity of a strong
parallelization of the data acquisition, on contrary to a
monostatic setup. This is beneficial for real-time imaging applications. An efficient illumination is realized
by a proper positioning of the transmit and receive
antennas. With a multistatic array arrangement, the
reconstruction formula becomes
o (yr) = / / / s (vrT, vrR, ~) e j c0 (R T + R R),
~

(4)

N~ NT NR

where R T = ; vrT - vr ; and R R = ; vrR - vr ; are the distances

between the transmit antennas, and the receive antennas relative to the position of the desired voxel, respectively. For multistatic imaging, the data can be focused
with fast reconstruction methods in Fourier domain
[38], [39] or by multilevel concepts in space domain [35].
Space domain reconstruction is numerically expensive, however does not suffer from any image degradation due to interpolation errors in Fourier domain.
If the DUT is in the far-field of the array, the reconstruction formulas (3) and (4) can be simplified by
assuming propagating plane waves. This leads to
reconstruction formulas which can be directly implemented based on FFTs. For the applications of NDT
and personnel screening, the distance between the
imaged object and the imager is nearly equal to the
array dimensions. Therefore, the object is located in
the near field of the array and the far-field approximation does not apply. Consequently, the transmitted and
reflected signals have to be treated as spherical waves.
To generate a mm-wave image without ambiguities,
a dense array with an element spacing of half the minimum wavelength, concerning the transmit/receive
signals, should be realized. In multistatic imaging,
however, the dense array arrangement has to be realized with either the transmit or the receive antennas
for each lateral direction. Therefore thinning of the
imaging array is possible without producing ambiguities. A possible technique for thinning is the use of a
randomly populated array (see Figure 4) or aperiodic
element spacing [40]. These concepts are well known
from aperture synthesis in radio astronomy [41], but
they suffer from an increased sidelobe level which
results in a loss of dynamic range in the resultant mmwave image.
For multistatic imaging, the approach of an effective aperture [42][44] can be used to form a sparse
periodic array (SPA) design. This approach is valid
under far field conditions, where the resulting effective array factor AE (u, v) of the multistatic array is
equal to the multiplication of the transmit array factor
AT (u, v) with the receive array factor AR (u, v), where u
and v describe the direction cosines with respect to the
array. As the array factor is mathematically equal to
the Fourier transformation of the aperture, this leads

September/October 2012

Thin film ceramic modules, LTCC

modules, and enhanced IC packages
integrating antennas on their signal
redistribution layers are all possible
options for medium-channel-count
systems.

0.25

0.15

y (m)

0.05
0
0.05

0 dB

0.15
80
40
0 0.05
x (m)

0.15

y (mm)

0.25
0.25 0.15 0.05

0.25

20

0
40

40

Figure 5. Array geometry (red for Tx antenna lines, blue

for Rx ones) [22].

A E (u, v) = A T (u, v) $ A R (u, v)

(5)

a E (x, y) = a T (x, y) ) ) a R (x, y)

(6)

The main advantage of a SPA design is the reduction

of the total number of antenna elements with respect
to conventional dense arrays. This is achieved by keeping a well sampled effective aperture, whereas the
physical apertures can be very sparse. As the target
distance L is similar to array dimensions, the target is
in the array near field, which produces residual ambiguities in the resulting mm-wave image. This effect

0.5

16
15
14
13
12
11
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1

0.3

y (m)

0.1
0
0.1
0.3
0.5
0.5 0.3 0.1

0
x (m)

0.1

0.3

0.5

80 40

40

80

60

x (mm)

Figure 7. Point spread function of the Tx array [22].

can be considerably reduced by introducing redundant antenna elements [44] or by modifying the array
arrangement [25], [45].
Following the SPA design concept, a novel array
architecture was introduced in [22], which is capable of
compensating for the drawbacks of the near field operation. Figure 5 illustrates the array geometry, and Figure 6 shows the associated allocation of the effective
aperture. The system operates from 72 to 80 GHz and
covers an aperture of 50 cm times 50 cm, populated
with 16 antenna clusters. The total number of antennas
is 736 transmit and 736 receive antennas. Fig ures 7
and 8 show the point spread function (PSF) of the
focused beam for the transmitter (Tx) and receiver (Rx)
apertures, respectively. In spite of the strong ambiguities seen, the overall transmit-receive PSF shown in
Figure 9 is free of any ambiguities. The background

0 dB
80
40
y (mm)

to an effective aperture aE (x, y) of the multistatic array

which results from the 2-D convolution between the
transmit and receive aperture distributions aT (x, y) and
aR (x, y), respectively. Their mathematical dependences
are described in (5) and (6).

80

20

0
40

40
80
80 40

40

80

60

x (mm)

Figure 6. Effective aperture of the multistatic array shown

in Figure 5.

September/October 2012

Figure 8. Point spread function of the Rx array [22].

31

If the design of monolithic integrated

front ends can be afforded, RF PCBs
with chip-on-board technology, which
allow also for integration of multilayer
planar antennas, are suitable for
frequencies up to 100 GHz.
level is below -60 dB, which is essential for generating images of high dynamic range after focusing.
The lateral resolution is of 2 mm in both directions.
Figure10 shows an image result of this system demonstrating the high image quality produced.

Technology Choices
The technology choices mainly depend on the chosen
frequency bands (ranging from a few gigahertz to several hundred gigahertz) and the number of channels
(ranging from a few ones to several thousands) present
in the system. Analog/RF front-end modules can be

0 dB

80

y (mm)

40
20
0
40

40
80

60
80

40

0
40
x (mm)
(a)

80

2 mm
15 mm

2 mm

(b)

Figure 9. (a) Overall transmit-receive PSF [22] and (b)

3-D rendering of the PSF, showing the resolution cell size
and the surrounding sidelobes [22].

32

built as waveguide modules, as microwave integrated

modules based on thin film ceramic technology, as
low-temperature cofired ceramic (LTCC) modules or
as an RF printed circuit board (PCB). Cost per channel
is decreasing in this list. For low-channel-count systems, the designer can rely on proven commercially
available modules, mostly available as connectorized
microwave integrated circuits or waveguide modules
at higher frequencies. With increasing channel count,
the space consumed by the front ends becomes critical, and higher integration is necessary. This is best
achieved by developing dedicated multichannel Tx
and Rx front-end modules. In high-channel-count
systems, mature manufacturing processes that are
suitable for mass production with good reproducibility are vital for achieving reliable results. At high
frequencies, interface losses are not negligible and the
RF frequency generation have to move near to or into
the analog front end, as well as the front end has to
be placed as near as possible to the antennas to minimize interface losses. For low-channel-count systems,
low loss but space-consuming interconnect technologies, e.g., waveguides, can be used. High-channelcount systems at high frequencies must integrate the
antenna into multichannel analog front-end modules. Thin film ceramic modules, LTCC modules, and
enhanced IC packages integrating antennas on their
signal redistribution layers are all possible options
for medium-channel-count systems or as submount
modules in high-channel-count systems. If the design
of monolithic integrated front ends can be afforded,
RF PCBs with chip-on-board technology, which allow
also for integration of multilayer planar antennas, are
suitable for frequencies up to 100 GHz. High-channelcount systems at frequencies higher than 100 GHz
have not yet been realized. Such systems require even
higher integration levels of multichannel monolithic
microwave integrated circuits (MMICs), possibly with
included on-chip antennas.
The choice of semiconductor technology for mmwave imaging will be a never ending discussion
depending on the addressed system parameters and
the availability of manufacturing facilities. Since the
availability of deep-submicron CMOS technologies
with transit frequencies exceeding 200 GHz [46], three
main technology options exist to realize mm-wave
integrated circuits: 1) III-V technologies, 2) SiGe bipolar (or BiCMOS), or 3) CMOS. All the three technology
classes, including III-V due to its large utilization in
mobile phones, are mature and can be used for production with good reproducibility. Regarding the RF
performance, e.g., noise, output power and thermal
stability, III-V technologies still clearly outperform
silicon based technologies and should be the preferred
option for imaging systems with low number of channels, i.e., mechanically scanning ones. Integration density capability of III-V technologies is obviously lower

September/October 2012

than SiGe bipolar or CMOS,

but should be high enough
for first generation imag10 mm
ing systems. On a long term
perspective, CMOS offers the
2.5 mm
best capability of integrating
RF front ends, analog circuits, baseband processing,
analog-to-digital converters (ADCs), digital-to-analog
converters (DACs), and DSP
units, all on one die. Integration of CMOS RF modules
is still, however, subject to
the challenges of solving
design difficulties to meet the
required performance at high
frequency and high bandwidth, and to solve reliabil14 mm
ity problems caused by hot
carrier degradation. Last but
(a)
(b)
not least, technology choice
will be determined by cost,
especially for large imaging Figure 10. Illustration of the imaging capability of the multistatic system using a U.S.
systems. With respect to the Air Force (USAF) test chart made of a metal sheet and mounted in front of a bed of nails
with absorber in their background. The nails are fixed to a grid of 10 mm distance. Each
total expected product volnail is of 5-mm diameter with an approximate radar cross-section of 50 dBsm. Due to
ume, not only wafer producthe high dynamic range of the image and the low sidelobe levels of the system, they are all
tion costs must be taken into clearly visible. The slots of the USAF chart are separable down to the 2 mm openings [22].
account but also development
on the approximation of spherical phase fronts and
costs and the cost for a production mask set. For 65 nm
hence any deviation from this assumption within the
and 40 nm CMOS technology, the cost of the producfield of view will cause image degradation. Therefore,
tion mask set is excessively high, which makes CMOS
phase centers should be stable over the beamwidth as
not yet a feasible option. From todays point of view, a
well as the bandwidth used, a criterion which is difpure bipolar process, which is already in use for mass
ficult to achieve with many types of antennas. Addimarket 77-GHz automotive radar applications [47],
tionally, polarization purity becomes an issue when
[48], gives the best cost effectiveness: mask set cost is
polarimetric imaging is demanded. Typical antenna
a fraction (less than a tenth) of a 40 nm CMOS mask
types used in imaging systems include for instance
set, production cost is clearly lower than for the III-V
slotline, patch, waveguide, horn, and dipole antennas.
technologies, and a large design reuse from existing
Tests with cavity backed circularly polarized spiral
automotive radar modules reduces development costs
antennas carried out in [49] showed positive aspects
and guarantees a short time-to-market. Next higher
of polarimetric imaging. In [50], a promising design
integration levels are possible by using SiGe BiCMOS
based on differential stripline feeds for realizing a
technology, which includes a nowadays relatively
polarimetric imaging system was introduced. Last but
cheap 130 nm CMOS technology in order to integrate
not least, antennas are required to be small in size . On
more digital and analog modules together.
one hand, the size of the antenna structure must allow
The choice of the used antenna is of central imporfor dense sampling of the wavefront at less than the
tance for any imaging system. Transmit and receive
wavelength, and on the other hand miniature antenna
antennas must couple the electromagnetic wave to the
design offers a feasible integration with MMICs for
medium of propagation while following certain design
successful array integration.
requirements to ensure proper operation. Furthermore,
image quality is highly influenced by the used signal
bandwidth which consequently must be supported
QPASS System
by the antennas. Antennas are often required to offer
The Quick Personnel Safe Screening system (QPASS)
high beamwidths as well as very stable phase centers.
was developed on the basis of multistatic DBF technolThe phase center describes a virtual point for a sphere
ogy to target the application of close-range personnel
center where the phase front can be approximated to
screening at airports and critical infrastructure buildbe radiated from. The image formation algorithms rely
ings [51]. The imaging array operates from 70 to 80GHz

September/October 2012

33

The choice of the used antenna

is of central importance for any
imaging system.

Cluster

47 Rx Antennas
94 Tx Antennas
2m
47 Rx Antennas

A basic unit, namely a cluster, integrates 96 Tx and

96 Rx channels in one housing, which is suited for flexibly building imaging arrays of different geometries
and sizes. A dedicated digital back end unit, including parallel analog to digital conversion and image
reconstruction kernels, has been developed. Four of
these units are integrated on a single PCB called an
IF-board in order to serve four clusters simultaneously. Four clusters, an IF-Board, a signal distribution
board, power supply, mechanics, and cooling parts
form together one unit. Four of these units are again
connected to a central board to form a complete array.
Then two of the arrays are connected to an industrial
PC (IPC) via fast PCI Express connection, resulting in
the complete imaging system.
The volume in front of the system is illuminated
sequentially by each of the Tx channels, and the complex reflected signals are simultaneously and coherently sampled by all Rx channels. These sampled data
are then processed, reflections are calculated, system
error correction is applied and the image is then reconstructed. The system block diagram of a single array is
shown in Figure 12.

1m

Signal Source
Figure 11. Photograph of QPASS system (without cover)
[55]. On the right, a cluster unit is shown [55].
with frequency-stepped continuous-wave technique.
The array design follows the same architecture as the
one in Figure 5, however extends to cover a two meters
times one meter aperture, as shown in Figure11. Two
arrays of square aperture are stacked vertically, where
each includes 1536 Tx channels and 1536 Rx channels, making a total of 6144 RF channels. This ensures
proper illumination of the human body [52]. Although
being developed for a specific application, the system
architecture features a highly modular design offering a flexible platform to address further applications
[53], [54].

Signal
Sources

Distribution Network

Digital-beamforming relies on accurate phase measurement for each Tx-Rx combination. Therefore, heterodyne reception is favorable, which hence requires
generation of coherent RF and local oscillator (LO)
signals. A dedicated synthesizer unit has been developed and optimized to generate the RF and LO signals
around 20 GHz in order to ease signal distribution to
all RF front ends. Direct digital synthesizers (DDSs)
are used to generate the signals, which are derived
from a highly stable oven-controlled crystal oscillator
(OCXO). DDSs are preferred here due to their ability to
switch frequencies very fast. Contrarily to free-running
oscillators, the DDSs can generate signals with a determined phase value, which is useful in many imaging
applications. After the DDSs, the frequency is multiplied by a factor of 256, and distributed to the clusters.

Acquisition
Hardware

Single Array Front End

1536
IF Signals

Image
Processing
and
Visualization

D
fRF/4
DSP
Front-end
Control
(fRFfIF)/4

Multicore
Computer

Control
Unit

Synthesizer Control

Figure 12. System block diagram of a single array.

34

September/October 2012

On each chip, the RF and LO signals are amplified,

quadrupled and distributed to four channels.

RF Front End
Each cluster contains 96 Tx and 96 Rx channels,
where four of them are used as internal reference
channels. The analog front ends are built of custommade four-channel receiver and transmitter chips,
which are connected to aperture-coupled patchexcited horn antennas. Those elements are embedded in a RF multilayer PCB. The chips are mounted
in multilevel cavities, as the antennas differential
feed lines run on an inner layer of the PCB, and for
RF performance reasons, vias and longer bond wires
have been avoided, as shown in Figure 13. The horn
part of the antennas is integrated into the cluster

Fastening Screw

Horn Antenna

QPASS was developed on the basis

of multistatic DBF technology to
target the application of close-range
personnel screening at airports and
critical infrastructure buildings.
housing, which also carries two RF and two LO
input ports.
A custom chipset has been designed for this system [56]. Both transmit (Figure 14) and receive (Figure 15) MMICs include four E-band channels and a
central RF or LO distribution with frequency quadrupling. The center frequency of operation is 75 GHz

Cover

Absorbing Material

Patch

Tx or Rx Chip

Bond Wire

Cavity

RF Part

Heat Sink
IF Part

Slot

Differential Line

Thermal Vias

Via

Figure 13. Cut view of the multilayer PCB illustrating the integration of MMIC and the antenna structure inside the
housing of the cluster.

Temp
Sensor

MUX

Analog Bus

RF Ch. 1

RF Ch. 2
RF
RF Ch. 3
Buf Follower
RF Ch. 4
Buf
Enable Quadrupler

PA
Gain On/Off

Figure 14. Block diagram of the four channels Tx SiGe Chip.

September/October 2012

35

RF Ch. 1
RF Ch. 2
LO
RF Ch. 3

Buf

Buf Follower
Temp
Sensor

RF Ch. 4
Buf

LNA

IF 1 IF 2 IF 3 IF 4
Analog Bus

Figure 15. Block diagram of the four channels Rx SiGe chip [55].

36

with a bandwidth of approximately 10 GHz. Figures

16 and 17 show photos of the Tx and Rx SiGe chips,
respectively.
The measured receiver conversion gain is 23 dB
with a SSB NF below 10 dB over a wide frequency
range from 70 to 82 GHz. The transmitter chip includes
4 output channels with an output power of more than
0dBm in a frequency range from 70 GHz to 86 GHz.
Both chips are supplied from a single 3.3 V supply
voltage and the power consumption per channel is
145mW for Tx and 180 mW for Rx. The process used
for this chipset is a very cost-effective pure SiGe:C
bipolar technology similar to the one described in [57].
It is based on a double-polysilicon self-aligned transis-

tor concept with shallow and deep trench isolation. An

example transistor is shown in Figure 18. The SiGe:C
base is deposited by selective epitaxy. A mono-crystalline emitter contact results in a small emitter resistance.
Different npn transistor types with cut-off frequencies
from 52 GHz to more than 200 GHz and collectoremitter breakdown voltages at open base (BVCEO)
from 5 V to 1.8 V are available. In addition to npn and
pnp transistors, the process provides polysilicon resistors with sheet resistances of 150 and 1,000 X/sq and
tantalium-nitride (TaN) thin film resistors with a sheet
resistance of 20X/sq. A metalinsulatormetal (MIM)
capacitor with Al2O3 dielectric and a specific capacitance of 1.4fF/nm2 is integrated in a four-layer copper

Figure 16. Photograph of the Tx chip with the integrated

four RF channels (size 2.2 # 2 mm2) [56].

Figure 17. Photograph of Rx chip with the integrated four

RF channels (size 2.2#2 mm2) [56].

September/October 2012

metallization. The use of an automotive-qualified bipolar process was furthermore very advantageous due
to the reuse of 77-GHz mass market automotive radar
designs [58], [59], which enabled meeting design targets after just two design iterations.

The radiated peak power is

approximately one milliwatt,
which is very low compared to
communication devices.

Antenna
MMIC frontends in a 2-D array with high element
count. They offer a small footprint and a high bandwidth by using a differentially fed dipole, resonant

The planar antennas used in the system are optimized

to fulfill the requirements of the imaging application,
together with the capability of integration with the

Base

Emitter

Collector

n+ Poly-Si

p+ -Poly

p MonoSiGe: C
(Base)

SiC

p -Isolation

STI
(Shallow Trench Iso)

Buried Layer

DT
(Deep Trench Isolation)

p -Substrate

(a)

Collector

Emitter

Base

Shallow Trench
SiGe:C Base
Deep Trench
(b)

Figure 18. Transmission electron microscopy image and a schematic of a cross section for a npn SiGe transistor [48], [56].
(Printed with permission from Infineon Technologies AG, Munich, Germany.)

September/October 2012

37

Polarization was purposely rotated by 45 in order to

reuse the same antenna on vertical as well as horizontal
antenna lines while keeping copolarized operation. The
internal layers of the PCB used to realize the antenna are
illustrated in Figure 13. Figures 19 and 20 show photos
of the integrated chip and the patch part of the antenna.
The simulation results of the antenna at 75 GHz for both
the copolarized and the cross-polarized components are
shown in Figure 21. The antenna has a wide beam with
approximately 8 dB gain and delivers high polarization
purity. The radiated peak power is approximately one
milliwatt, which is very low compared to communication devices, e.g., mobile phones.

Differential Line
Control and IF Signals

Miled First Cavity

Patch Antenna

20-GHz
Input

Chip Mounted
into Miled
Second Cavity

Supply

Ground Contacts

Digital Back End

Figure 19. Chip integration in a multilayer PCB including

the patch part of antennas shown on the right side [62].

The digital back end performs measurement acquisition, system control and monitoring, digitization of
IF signals, system error correction, and image reconaperture slots, and a patch element. Input matching and
struction. The IF signals are amplified and then digibeamshape are improved by a stacked cylindrical horn,
tized by an eight-channel ADC chip at 50 MSa/s, as
which also enhances isolation to neighboring elements
shown on the left of Figure 22. The signals are further
together with a via-ring cavity in the substrate [60], [61].
down-converted digitally to
zero IF and subsequently filThree-Way
Cavity
tered. Conversion and DSP
Wilkinson
Thin-Film
Divider
are performed in parallel,
Resistors
the system implements 2 x
1536 coherent digital receiver
Two-Way Wilkinson Divider
chains, which is necessary to
achieve the short measurement time. For each single
measurement, twelve samples are required to account
for the channel and filter set3 mm
tling times [55]. The collected
reflection data are compared
to reference channels built
Figure 20. Photograph of the cluster without housing showing the signal distribution,
inside the system in order to
chip integration, and the patch part of the antennas [61], [62].

yy

Phi

Phi

dB
8
x
6
4
2
0

Theta

Theta
The
Th
T
he
h
eta

16

24
32
(a)

(b)

Figure 21. Simulation of the radiation pattern of a single antenna showing the polarization purity and the beam quality. On
the left, the copolarized component of the field is shown, and on the right the cross-polarized component.

38

September/October 2012

ADC95

e j

e j

DDC95

e j DDC1

Data Acquisition
DDC0

32
High-SpeedInterfaces at
36 Gb/s
1.15 Tb/s

..
.

Memory
Controller

Calculate
Reflections

Reconstruction
Memory
Controller
4x

Figure 22. Block diagram of the digital back end used in the QPASS system.

3072 ADCs
at 50 MHz
138 GS/s

ADC1

ADC0

32x

IF Signals

IF Signals

32x

HSSI

48x

AGU

Cache

AGU

AGU

AGU

DDR3
1 GB

32x

Cache

1536 Reconstruction Kernels

10.6 TOPS/s

DDR3
1 GB

32x

Cache

Reconstruction Kernels

Cache

32x

DDR3
1 GB

Memory
Controller

Memory
Controller

HSSI

DDR3
1 GB

Legend

2 PCIe at
32 Gb/s
64 Gb/s

IPC

IPC

Industrial-PC

AGU Address-Generating-Unit

HSSI High-Speed Serial Interface

DDC Digital Down-Converter

ADC Analog-Digital-Converter

32
High-SpeedInterfaces
at 10.9 Gb/s
349 Gb/s

..
.

Data Collection

2x

PCI Express

September/October 2012

39

Touchpanel

Active imaging ensures image

production with a high dynamic
range, which is required by many
applications where objects are to
be found behind surfaces or inside
volumes.
compensate for any thermal drifts and thus ensuring
high stability over long time of operation. Then the
image reconstruction takes place at each cluster unit in
a parallelized fashion, in order to minimize the transferred data rates inside the system. The digital back
end offers a fast PCI Express connection to the integrated IPC, which is used to transfer the reconstructed
3-D images in magnitude and phase. The images can
then be prepared for direct display or used for further
image processing steps beforehand.
A cutting-edge realization of the digital back end
has been designed to deal with the huge data rates of
1.15 Tb/s collected by the system. The reconstruction
hardware needs to perform 10.6 Tera-operations-persecond in order to deliver full image reconstruction in
approximately two seconds. Figure 22 illustrates the
signal flow within the digital back end and reveals
part of its inherent complexity.

0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2

y (m)

0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
0.5

0
x (m)
(a)

The QPASS system is capable to produce 3-D

images of 30 dB dynamic range and 2 mm of lateral
resolution. Figure 23 illustrates an example image
of a person concealing two dielectric objects, which
demonstrates the system capability to address personnel screening applications. In Figure 24, another
image using colors is presented to demonstrate the
3-D content of the image. The color codes the range
information of each voxel, where red is close and
blue is far relative to the imager surface. Figure 25
illustrates a detailed view of the pistol, and demonstrates the high system resolution, allowing to
image features of a few millimeters in size. In the
application of personnel screening, privacy issues
can arise. Therefore, the 3-D images are further processed with dedicated detection algorithms in order
to automatically and anonymously find concealed
objects of any potential hazards such as weapons or
explosives.
Moreover, the system is also capable to detect depth
variations down to 50 um [51], thanks to its exceptional
signal phase stability. This corresponds to a phase
measurement accuracy of 5 in the reconstructed
image. Such a feature is attractive to many applications
addressing accurate 3-D modeling of surfaces, which
stands as a competitive solution to optical scanners.
With the flexible and modular design concept for
both the RF front ends as well as the digital backend, t he system ca n be
reconfigured to adapt different imaging modes and
can be geometrically modified to cover various aperture dimensions. The high
image dynamic range ensures
images of 30 dB free of any
artifacts, which also open the
possibility for image processing techniques, including
super-resolution algorithms,
to enhance the imaging capability of the system specifically for certain applications.
Many algorithms for object
detection and classification
are being either adapted or
newly developed to deal with
the rich 3-D image information delivered by the system
in magnitude and phase.

0.5

Conclusion and Outlook

(b)

Figure 23. Image of a person taken from 70 to 80 GHz [55]. Image shows the magnitude
information after being projected along range direction. Two concealed dielectric objects,
liquid bag (up) and explosive simulant (down), are marked with red rectangles.

40

Microwave imaging systems

are exhibiting a continuous
improvement in their performance combined with a
remarkable increase in their

September/October 2012

complexity and level of integration. The advances in

The reconstruction hardware needs
semiconductor technology assist this development
to perform 10.6 Tera-operationson one side, and the increase in the computational
power of modern computers and DSP units supper-second in order to deliver
ports the DBF techniques on the other side. Imagfull image reconstruction in
ing systems based on reflectors, mirrors, lenses, or
approximately two seconds.
complex phased-array components are becoming
less attractive for many applications. Instead, software derived technologies are coming to the frontier
of the state-of-the-art solutions. These technologies
allow for an optimal image focusing at all range
distances and are not restricted to focal lengths.
The applicability of these techniques are moving to
cover the mm-wave range, and are even pushed to
reach the terahertz band.
Active imaging ensures image production with
a high dynamic range, which is required by many
applications where objects are to be found behind
surfaces or inside volumes. Multistatic array architectures for industrial and security applications
have been intensively investigated during the last
years. Multistatic imaging allows for a huge reduction factor in the total number of needed channels,
and hence opens the opportunity for fully electronic
solutions to be realized. Many of the numerical complications caused by multistatic imaging are nowadays affordable due to the available computational
capabilities.
As integration levels are getting higher, modular concepts with combined analog and digital units
are becoming reachable. Power consumption of the
involved devices is much reduced, thus allowing for
compact modular designs. Semiconductor technologies are offering various options for system realization depending on cost and performance. In addition,
PCB manufacturing has been significantly enhanced
to be a cost-efficient carrier to MMICs and antennas
aside of each other. Frequency ranges up to 100 GHz
Figure 24. Image of a person concealing a P99 pistol on
the back. The reflectivity image is here multiplied by the
are currently realizable using these technologies, and
colored range information to visualize the 3-D content of
higher frequencies can be supported with submount
the image. The range changes from red to blue as close to far
techniques.
from the imager, respectively.
The first steps towards a fully electronic
solution based on multistatic systems and
DBF technique have been made and proved to
be efficient and affordable. This is best demonstrated by the QPASS system, which integrates
around 6,000 coherent RF channels realized on
SiGe technology and included aswell an integrated image reconstruction unit. Challenges
are still there to build even more advanced
imaging systems featuring full polarimetric imaging, faster image reconstruction
units, and combined reflection-transmission
(a)
(b)
imaging. Polarimetric multistatic imaging will increase the detection capabilities Figure 25. Photograph and mm-wave image of P99 pistol concealed
by using methods based on ellipsometry behind a thick pullover and a leather belt. Metal features inside the plastic
grip, e.g., the magazine, are clearly visible.
known from optics.

September/October 2012

41

In the near future, new imaging

facilities based on modern
mm-wave technologies will bring
new opportunities to the humankind
to take advantage of simple
hand-held up to professional
large scale imagers.

[13] S. Wietzke, F. Rutz, C. Jrdens, N. Krumbholz, N. Vieweg, C. Jansenb, R. Wilk, and M. Koch, Applications of terahertz spectroscopy in the plastics industry, in Proc. SPIE Teraherz Photonics, 2008,
vol. 6840.
[14] S. Ahmed, O. Ostwald, and L.-P. Schmidt, Automatic detection of
concealed dielectric objects for personnel imaging, in Proc. IEEE
MTT-S Int. Microwave Workshop Wireless Sensing, Local Positioning
and RFID, 2009, pp. 14.
[15] H. von Aschen, F. Gumbmann, L.-P. Schmidt, High resolution
permittivity reconstruction of one dimensional stratified dielectric media from broadband measurement data in the W-band, in
Proc. European Radar Conf. (EuRAD), Oct. 1214, 2011, pp.4548.

In the near future, new imaging facilities based

on modern mm-wave technologies will bring new
opportunities to the humankind to take advantage of
simple hand-held up to professional large scale imagers, serving their demands especially where x-ray or
ultrasonic methods are not feasible. New applications
assisted by tailored algorithms for image processing,
classification, and interpretation will come up one
after another. And at the same time, the system prices
will drop following the progress in semiconductor market. This can make such systems applicable
for mass production and put them as an option for
everyday use.

[19] A. D. Semenov, H. Richter, U. Bottger, A. V. Smirnov, and H.-W.

Hubers, Distant detection of hidden objects with a THz imaging
radar, in Proc. Infrared and Millimeter-waves, 2007 and the 2007 15th
Int. Conf. Terahertz Electronics IRMMW-THz. Sept. 29, 2007, pp.
652653.

Acknowledgment

[20] A. Schiessl and S. S. Ahmed, W-Band imaging of explosive substances, in Proc. 6th European Radar Conf., 2009, pp. 617620.

[16] M. I. Skolnik, Introduction to Radar Systems. New York: McGrawHill, 1962.

[17] R. D. Wehner, High-Resolution Radar. Boston: Artech House, 1995.
[18] K. B. Cooper, R. J. Dengler, N. Liombart, T. Bryllert, G. Chattopadhyay, E. Schlecht, J. Gill, C. Lee, A. Skalare, I. Mehdi, and P.
H. Siegel, Penetrating 3-D imaging at 4- and 25-m range using
a submillimeter-wave radar, IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech.,
vol. 56, no. 12, pp. 27712778, 2008.

The authors would like to thank the German Federal

Ministry of Education and Research for funding part
of the presented activities.

[21] P. A. Corredoura, Z. A. Baharav, B. A. Taber, and G. A. Lee, Millimeter-wave imaging system for personnel screening: Scanning 107
points a second and using no moving parts, in Proc. SPIE Passive
Millimeter-Wave Imaging Technology IX, 2006, vol. 6211.

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