A Wideband E‐plane Pattern Reconfigurable Antenna with Enhanced Gain

A novel method of steering antenna beam in its E‐plane is introduced and a design of wideband pattern reconfigurable antenna with enhanced gain is proposed in this paper. A bowtie antenna is used as the driven radiator, and two parasitic bowtie‐shaped microstrip stubs with two diodes are loaded beside each arm of the driven radiator. With the introducing of a low profile artificial magnetic conductor (AMC) beneath the bowtie radiator, unidirectional radiation pattern can be obtained. By altering the working states of the diodes, the main beam of the antenna can be switched in its E‐plane. The biasing circuit of the antenna is simple and easy to be implemented. The prototype of the antenna is fabricated, and good agreement can be observed between the simulated and measured results. Compared to other pattern reconfigurable antennas, the proposed antenna has advantages of a wide operating band, ability of beam switching in E‐plane, and high gain. These advantages makes it a good candidate for the wireless communication systems.     

Decoupling antenna array with X‐shaped strip

Manipulating mutual coupling between antenna array elements is always a critical essential in designing phased arrays. In this article, an X‐shaped strip is applied to decouple a five‐element E‐plane microstrip antenna array, whose adjacent elements' center‐to‐center spacing is only 0.45 λ₀. Simulation and measurement results reveal that the proposed array employing the loaded structure exhibits excellent decoupling capability, as in comparison to the reference array, impedance of every port is well matched, mutual coupling between both adjacent elements and nonadjacent ones is efficiently reduced and radiation patterns of every individual patch are markedly corrected. Besides, when beam scanning is performed, the proposed array is equipped with higher gain and lower SLL. The X‐shaped strip predicts a promising application in phased array and a large‐scale array.     

A novel wideband circularly polarized modified square‐slot antenna with loaded strips

In this article, a novel inverted L‐shaped microstrip‐fed wideband circularly polarized (CP) modified square‐slot antenna is designed. By cutting a pair of triangle chamfers and introducing a pair of triangle patches at the square‐slot, the antenna achieves a wideband CP radiation. Moreover, CP performance of the antenna can also be remarkably enhanced by protruding an L‐shaped strip and embedding a tuning rectangle slot into the slot ground. The measured results demonstrate that the axial‐ratio bandwidth for AR < 3 is 75.1% (from 4.45 to 9.8 GHz) and the impedance bandwidth (|S₁₁| < ?10 dB) reaches 65.8% (from 4.95 to 9.8 GHz). In addition, surface current studies are performed to illustrate the operating mechanism of CP operation, and the antenna has bidirectional radiation characteristics with an average gain of ~4 dBic within the CP band.     

Design of a novel compact modified‐circular printed antenna for high data rate wireless sensor networks

This paper presents a novel compact circular patch Ultrawideband (UWB) antenna for sensor node applications. The microstrip‐fed low‐profile antenna comprises an elliptical ring slot, two crescent‐shaped slots and two dumbbell‐shaped slots in feedline. The antenna miniaturization is achieved by a novel combination of an elliptical ring slot, two crescent‐shaped slots in circular patch. The proposed prototype has been fabricated on inexpensive FR4 substrate and the relative permittivity is (ε_r = 4.3) with 1.6 mm thickness. The overall size of the proposed miniaturized antenna is about (0.1 λ_r × 0.15 λ_r), where λ_r is the resonating wavelength of the lowest UWB frequency (ie, 3.1 GHz). The measured radiation performances of the proposed antenna are nearly an omnidirectional pattern in H‐plane and bidirectional pattern in E‐plane for all the frequencies in the whole UWB band. The development process of the antenna, radiation properties and group delay is completely analyzed and discussed.     

Dual‐band dual‐polarized compact planar monopole antenna for wide axial ratio bandwidth application

In this article, a geometrically simple, microstrip line‐fed planar monopole structure with slanting edge ground plane is designed to realize the dual‐band dual‐polarized operation. The proposed antenna consists of a rotated U‐shaped patch and an electromagnetically coupled L‐shaped parasitic radiating element. Owing to the combination of microstrip line‐fed radiating patch and a slanting‐edge rectangular ground plane on the opposite side of the substrate, the proposed dual‐band antenna can generate broad axial ratio bandwidth (ARBW) in the upper frequency band. The overall dimension of the prototype is only 32 × 32 × 1.6 mm³. The measured results validate that the proposed antenna has two operational frequency bands, 29.84% (1.54‐2.08 GHz) for linearly polarized radiation and 71.85% (3.96‐8.4 GHz) for circularly polarized radiation. Measured result shows that 3‐dB ARBW of the proposed antenna is 73.54% (3.80‐8.22 GHz) in the higher frequency band. It shows that the higher frequency band exhibits a left‐hand circularly polarized radiation in the boresight direction.     

Novel wide‐beam cross‐dipole CP antenna for GNSS applications

A wide‐beam circularly polarized (CP) cross‐dipole antenna for GNSS applications is proposed in this article. This cross‐dipole antenna is fed by a coaxial cable, on which the slots is added to optimize the impedance matching. These two pairs of dipole arms are designed with different lengths to obtain the circularly polarized radiation. Enhanced wide‐beam CP radiation characteristics can be achieved by curving the dipole arms and adjusting the distance between the arms and the metallic ground plane. The study of proposed antenna performance with different geometric parameters has been conducted. The final antenna exhibits a good impedance bandwidth (IBW) of ～13.1% (1.50‐1.71 GHz), and the 3‐dB axial‐ratio bandwidth is over 7% (1.52‐1.64 GHz). Broad pattern coverage of more than 140°, pure CP radiation at all designed bands and a wide 3 dB axial‐ratio beamwidth (ARBW) of nearly 150° makes this antenna an excellent candidate for satellite communications and navigation systems.     

Design of a 16‐beam pattern‐reconfigurable antenna for vehicular environment

This article presents the design of a multipattern antenna with pattern switching for vehicular communications. The proposed antenna has four triangular patches integrated onto a split square ring (SR) resonator to operate at two distinct frequencies, viz. 2.4 and 3.5 GHz. The proposed antenna is designed with a view to enhancing the link reliability of Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), WiMax, and vehicle to vehicle communication frequencies. Each triangular patch is separately excited using a microstrip line feed to enable beam steering. The ground plane of the antenna is embedded with two SR slots to improve the bandwidth and radiation performance. Further gain enhancement is achieved by loading the antenna with a plane reflector located at a distance of 20 mm from the antenna's ground surface. In reality, this reflector is realized using the vehicle's roof which provides gain enhancement up to 5.2 dBi at 2.4 GHz and 4 dBi at 3.5 GHz. By exciting single to multiple ports sequentially 16 different radiation patterns are obtained, which provides high‐gain omnidirectional coverage. The prototype antenna is fabricated and the simulation results are verified using experimental measurements. From the results, it is evident that the proposed antenna is suitable for vehicular communication applications.     

A low profile aperture coupled antenna with broadband circular polarization characteristics for UHF RFID applications

An aperture coupled microstrip‐line fed antenna (circular patch) with CP radiation is initially investigated. To achieve good CP radiation at 925 MHz UHF RFID frequency, the technique of loading an inverted C‐shaped slit into the circular patch is initially proposed. By further loading an open eccentric‐ring shaped parasitic element around the circular patch, an additional CP frequency can be excited at 910 MHz, and by combining these two CP frequencies, broad CP bandwidth that can cover the entire 902‐928 MHz UHF RFID band is achieved. Because of the parasitic element, the total dimension of proposed antenna is modified to 170 × 170 × 11.4 mm³. From the measured results, the impedance and CP bandwidths of the proposed antenna were 9.4% (859‐944 MHz) and 3.1% (902‐930 MHz). Furthermore, its corresponding peak gain and efficiency are 5.9 dBic and 84.3%, respectively. Further analyses have shown that the proposed antenna can also achieve good CP frequency agility across the desired UHF RFID operating band (902‐928 MHz).     

Stacked rectangular dielectric resonator antenna with different volumes for wideband circular polarization coupled with step‐shaped conformal strip

This paper presents a wideband circularly polarized broadside radiation characteristics by using stacked rectangular dielectric resonator antenna (DRA) with different volumes. In this designed antenna, the wide input impedance‐ and axial ratio (AR)‐bandwidths come from three factors: stacked rectangular DR with different volumes, stepped‐shaped conformal strip associated with microstrip line as a feed and different type of partial ground plane. Here, the orthogonal TE^x_δ11 and TE^y_1δ1 modes have been responsible for the generation of CP radiation in stacked rectangular DRA. Measured results show that the proposed stacked rectangular DRA with different volumes achieves input impedance bandwidth of 54.84% while AR bandwidth has been found to be 11.53%. The proposed antenna provides broadside right‐handed CP radiation pattern with gain ranges from 2.27–5.80 dBic and offers an average radiation efficiency of 89.48%, across the entire working bandwidth, respectively. Therefore, this antenna is very much useful for the ISM 2400 band applications.     

A compact and grounded comb‐shaped microstrip antenna: A key to realize enhanced radiation performance

A compact grounded comb‐shaped single‐element microstrip antenna is proposed with wide beam width and symmetrical radiation pattern in both principal and diagonal planes. The proposed antenna exhibits excellent isolation of around 35 dB between co‐polarized and cross‐polarized radiation while the same for a conventional patch is only 15 dB. Around 105°‐110° of 3 dB beamwidth is achieved in both principal and diagonal (skew) planes at the center frequency. Around 1.5 dB of front‐to‐back radiation isolation is found from the proposed patch. Most importantly, the proposed antenna produces 65% and 35% broader beam in H‐ and E‐planes, respectively, than that of a classical microstrip antenna. Furthermore, in all principal and diagonal planes, the radiation pattern is found to be symmetrical in a wide angular region (?125° to +125°).     

A small single fed broadband circularly polarized slot antenna

In this research, we present a simple single fed small broadband circularly polarized (CP) antenna. The proposed structure has the advantage of simultaneously obtaining broadband ARBW and IMBW in a small size (0.64λ × 0.62λ × 0.01λ), where λ is the free‐space wavelength at the center frequency. The measured S₁₁ BW is 100% (2.15‐6.44 GHz), which is completely overlapped by the measured ARBW of 108.7% (2.09‐7.07 GHz), which are wider than most published papers. The antenna consists of an off‐center microstrip feed line, an inverted rectangular bracket‐shape (IRBS) parasitic strip, and a modified ground plane. The modified ground plane has three linked slots and a protruded L‐shaped stub (LSS). The IRBS parasitic strip and the feed line are on one side of the substrate, whereas the ground plane is on the other side. The IRBS and LSS are overlaid up and down. The novelties of the structure are that the design mechanics is simple and clear as follows: (a) The three linked slots make the ground asymmetrical, and the asymmetrical ground makes the broadband IMBW in a small size preliminarily formed. Though the AR is around 8 dB, the fluctuation of AR inside the operation frequency band is little. (b) The off‐center feeding line, IRBS parasitic strip, and the LSS chain together through capacitance coupling, and the current path is formed, then the AR below 3 dB in the whole frequency band is generated. The peak gain and radiation efficiency are of 5.5 dBi and 95%, respectively. The proposed antenna is a good candidate for the application of various wireless communication systems, such as WLAN, WiMAX, and RFID.     

Wideband asymmetric microstrip‐fed circularly polarized antenna with monofilar spiral stub for WLAN application

A wideband circularly polarized printed antenna is proposed and fabricated, which employs monofilar spiral stubs and a slit in the asymmetrical ground plane which are fed by an inverted L‐shaped microstrip feedline. The CP operation is realized by embedding an inverted‐L shaped strip and modified ground plane and can be markedly improved by loading monofilar spiral stubs asymmetrically connected at the edge of the ground plane. After optimization, the measured results of the finally structure demonstrate that a 10‐dB bandwidth of 67.6% from 4.6 to 9.3 GHz and a 3‐dB axial‐ratio bandwidth (ARBW) for circular polarization (CP) of 60.1% from 5 to 9.3 GHz could be achieved which could completely cover the WLAN (5.725‐5.85 GHz) band. Therefore, the proposed antenna is suitable for circular polarization applications in C band. To explain the mechanism of broadband circular polarization operation, the analysis of magnetic fields distributions and a parametric study of the design are given. Compared to other recent works, a simpler structure, wider axial ratio and impedance bandwidths and a more compact size are the key features of the proposed antenna.     

Coaxial cavity waveguide antennas excited by stacked circular microstrip patches for use as prime‐focus reflector feeds

A coaxial cavity antenna excited by a stacked circular microstrip antenna is investigated as a feed for prime‐focus parabolic reflector antennas. The radiation pattern of the proposed cavity‐backed antenna is saddle shaped, which widens the ?10 dB beamwidths and increases the reflector efficiency especially for deep reflectors with small focal length‐to‐diameter ratios. With a single‐probe feed, the co‐polar radiation pattern is slightly asymmetric in the E‐plane, but is made symmetric by a differential feeding technique, using two probes. The impedance bandwidth of the proposed feed antenna is 20%. The antenna was fabricated and tested, and it exhibited good agreement between simulation and measurement results. The gain factor of the feed was also studied with a circular‐symmetric reflector and provided a gain factor of 79% at f/D = 0.375. This type of feed can be used as an alternative to conventional horn or waveguide feeds, where reduced size and light‐weight are desirable with added advantage of easy integration with electronics.     

A compact planar inverted‐F antenna with U‐shaped strip for all‐metal‐shell handset application

A compact dual‐band planar inverted‐F antenna (PIFA) with U‐shaped strip is proposed in this work for all‐metal‐shell mobile telephone application. As metal‐shell handsets are getting more and more popular nowadays, it raises a big challenge in antenna design as the metal‐shell associated with surrounding electronic components like front‐back‐cameras and telephone receiver would affect the antenna performance. This work provides an optional solution to alleviate this problem, where the metal shell of the handset and a U‐shaped strip are utilized as part of the antenna. The proposed antenna is able to generate radiation at 2.4 GHz for Wi‐Fi application with the help of the metal shell while using the U‐shaped strip can achieve a resonance at 1.575 GHz for GPS application. A prototype has been fabricated to verify the radiation performance in a practical handset test environment.     

A dual‐polarized cross‐dipole antenna with wide beam and high isolation for base station

In this paper, a dual‐polarized cross‐dipole antenna with wide beam and high isolation is designed and analyzed for base station. The proposed antenna consists of two planar cross dipoles with four square patches, two L‐shaped microstrip lines, two ground plates, four parasitic patches, and a reflector. The square patches are placed between the center of cross dipoles to couple with L‐shaped microstrip lines. By introducing the parasitic patches, the wide beam can be realized. The measured results show that the proposed antenna achieves an impedance bandwidth (|S₁₁| < ?10 dB) of about 18.7% (1.9‐2.35 GHz) and an isolation better than 30 dB. A measured gain of 5.7 dBi and a half‐power beamwidth over 120° at the center frequency are obtained. Furthermore, the size of the proposed antenna is only 0.5λ₀ × 0.5λ₀ × 0.22λ₀ (λ₀ is wavelength at the center frequency).     

Design of a compact protrudent‐shaped ultra‐wideband multiple‐input‐multiple‐output/diversity antenna with band‐rejection capability

In this endeavor, a new multiple‐input‐multiple‐output antenna with a sharp rejection at wireless local area network (WLAN) band is designed and practically examined for portable wireless ultra‐wideband applications. The intended diversity antenna possess a small size of 15 mm × 26 mm and two inverted L‐strip are loaded over the conventional rectangular patch antenna to form protrudent‐shaped radiator that acts as a radiating element. The sharp band‐rejection capability at WLAN is established by incising the L‐shaped slits at the decoupling structure. More than ?21 dB isolation is accomplished for the complete working band (ie, 2.87 ‐17 GHz). Degradation in the antenna efficiency at the center frequency of band rejection corroborates the good interference rejection capability. The working capabilities of the intended antenna are tested by using the isolation between the ports, total efficiency, gain, envelope correlation coefficient, radiation pattern, mean effective gain, and total active reflection coefficient.     

Compact microstrip‐via‐fed wideband circularly polarized antenna with monofilar spiral stub for C‐band applications

A wideband circularly polarized printed antenna is proposed and fabricated, which employs monofilar spiral stubs and a slit in the asymmetrical ground plane which is fed by an asymmetrical microstrip feedline using a via. The CP operation is realized by embedding an inverted‐L shaped strip and a modified ground plane and can be markedly improved by loading monofilar spiral stubs connected to the asymmetric feedline by means of a via. A parametric study of the key parameters is made and the mechanism for circular polarization is described. After optimization, the impedance bandwidth is approximately 3.6 GHz (4.4‐8 GHz) and the 3 dB axial ratio bandwidth is approximately 3.3 GHz (4.7‐8 GHz), which represent fractional bandwidths of approximately 58.1% and 52%, respectively. Therefore, the proposed antenna is suitable for circular polarization applications in C (4‐8 GHz) band. Compared with other recent works, the simpler structure, wider axial ratio, impedance bandwidths, and more compact size are the key features of the proposed antenna.     

Broadband circularly polarized Z‐shaped dipole antenna with parasitic strips

A Z‐shaped dipole antenna with parasitic strips is proposed for wideband and unidirectional circular polarization operation in this article. The dipole arms are bent into L‐shape for circular polarization, and printed balun is used to achieve good impedance matching. To further extend the axial ratio bandwidth, two parasitic strips are employed to introduce an additional band of circularly polarized operation at the high frequency. Measured results demonstrate that the proposed antenna has a 10‐dB impedance bandwidth of 63.3% (1.64‐3.16 GHz) and a 3‐dB axial ratio bandwidth of 51.1% (1.72‐2.9 GHz). Stable radiation patterns with gain around 9 dBic along +z‐axis are also observed.     

Broadband circularly polarized antenna with moon‐shaped parasitic element

A broadband circularly polarized (CP) circular patch antenna with an L‐shaped ground plane and parasitic element is studied. The use of this L‐shaped ground is to achieve short probe feed connection to the circular patch, while maintaining a certain height between the circular patch and ground plane, so that good impedance matching and bandwidth enhancement can be attained. To achieve CP radiation, two notches are initially loaded diagonally into the circular patch, and to further enhance the CP bandwidth, a novel technique of loading a small size moon‐shaped parasitic element into the notched circular patch is proposed. By doing so, the CP bandwidth of proposed antenna can be tremendously increased by approximately 10%. The experimental results show that the proposed CP antenna can yield impedance bandwidth and CP bandwidth of 835–1150 MHz and 839–968 MHz, respectively, with good gain level of 7.6 dBic. Therefore, this proposed wideband CP antenna can be used for UHF (ultrahigh frequency) RFID (radio frequency identification) reader antenna that operates within the universal RFID bands (840 ? 960 MHz). © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J RF and Microwave CAE 26:387–395, 2016