Microwave method for reference-plane-invariant and thickness-independent permittivity determination of liquid materials

Abstract

An attractive transmission-reflection method based on reference-plane invariant and thickness-independent expressions has been proposed for accurate and unique retrieval of complex permittivity of dielectric liquid samples. The method uses both branch-index-independent expressions and a restricted solution set for determining unique and fast complex permittivities. A 2D graphical method has been applied to demonstrate the operation and validation of the proposed method. A uncertainty analysis has been performed to monitor how the accuracy of the proposed method can be improved by a correct selection of sample holder properties. Scattering parameter measurements of two tested reference liquids (distilled water and methanol) have been carried out for comparison of various techniques with the proposed one when the reference-planes and sample thickness are not precisely known. We note from the comparison that whereas other techniques are seriously affected by imprecise knowledge of both reference-planes and sample thickness, the proposed method removes this restriction. © 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.