Magnetostatic wave convolvers

The present paper reviews recent theoretical results, and reports initial experimental results, on the convolution of contra-propagating magnetostatic forward volume waves (MSFVWs), in the form of cw signals or time-limited cw pulses, in an epitaxial yttrium iron garnet (YIG) film. Computations of the convolver bilinearity factor F_int indicate an efficient convolution process over a wide bandwidth, with values of F_int that are of the same order as, or better than, the reported experimental results for MSW convolution in a YIG cylindrical or plate geometry. The values of F_int determined experimentally are in excellent agreement with theory. These results are of interest to microwave system developers particularly if bandwidths of 1 GHz or larger can be realized in practice. A limiting feature of magnetostatic wave (MSW) convolvers is that the maximum delay time of a delay line that is realizable without excessive insertion loss is in the order of 0.5 μs. The advantage of MSW convolvers, of course, lies in their ability to perform signal processing directly at microwave frequencies, and in applications such as electronic warfare the advantageously large bandwidths would mitigate the limitations in delay time.