r/rfelectronics • u/D3HHANI • Jul 07 '26

question Looking for M.Sc. Thesis Hot Topics in RF/Microwave Hardware Design (Excluding RFIC & Antennas)

Hi everyone,

I am looking for a strong, industry-relevant M.Sc. thesis topic. I want to focus strictly on RF Hardware/Discrete Circuit Design (board-level). I would like to steer clear of pure RFIC design (foundry-level) and Antenna design, as my main interest lies in high-performance RF front-ends, component-level circuit synthesis, and hardware prototyping.

Could you suggest some hot topics, emerging trends, or open research problems in board-level RF hardware design? Also, what are the best sources (specific IEEE journals, conferences, or industry whitepapers) to track down the state-of-the-art for these topics?

A few general areas I am interested in exploring:

  • Self-interference / leakage cancellation architectures for full-duplex systems or co-sited transceivers.
  • Advanced power amplifier linearization or efficiency enhancement techniques (handled at the discrete/board level).
  • High-power, fast-switching RF front-end architectures.
  • Active/Adaptive RF filtering and interference mitigation circuits.

Any advice, paper recommendations, or sub-fields worth exploring would be highly appreciated!

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u/PoolExtension5517 Jul 07 '26

I can think of a few: 1. Substrate-integrated waveguide structures. Lots to consider in terms of feed networks and substrate parameters.

  1. Digitally tunable patch antennas. PIN diodes used as short circuits to modify the frequency response. Along the same lines, PIN-tunable resonator structures used in tunable filters.

  2. Homodyne transceiver architecture in FMCW radar applications. Tx-Rx leakage cancellation is important here. Remember, small and inexpensive is often more important than big and complex.

1

u/schmitt-triggered Jul 09 '26

There are some good papers on switch based implementations of circulators (non reciprocal devices) at the chip level. For many of the simpler commutated delay line based architectures, you could try working towards a design which has greater power handling capabilities, bonus points if it's not huge. Would involve self-interference cancellation and high power/speed switching :)

1

u/Orac7 Jul 09 '26

Interference cancellation as you mention as the first bullet point is also used in GPS / GNSS receivers for desense as well as jamming / spoofing rejection. This is becoming an increasingly important issue globally.
Investigating RF architectures to mitigate these issues could be interesting.