Directional‐coupler‐based microwave sensors for differential angular‐displacement measurement

The novel application of microwave directional couplers to develop angular‐displacement microwave sensors is reported. The proposed sensor approach employs as stator a branch‐line‐type coupler arranged in transversal mode by loading its direct and coupled ports with two distinct‐length open‐ended stubs. Thus, by taking the isolated port of the coupler as the stator output node, a bandpass filtering transfer function with transmission zeros (TZs) is created. Then, a rotor made up of an angularly‐moveable open‐ended stub is attached to a curved section of the longest loading stub of the stator through physical contact, so that their interconnection point varies with the angular‐displacement of the rotor. In this manner, the sensor transfer function is altered with the stub rotation through TZ reallocation, angular‐displacement sensing capabilities are achieved. The theoretical operational foundations of the conceived branch‐line‐coupler‐based microwave angular‐displacement sensor, which features single/multi‐band sensing properties in terms of inter‐TZ spacing and stop band attenuation levels, along with design examples and curves are provided. The extrapolation of this sensor principle to other classes of power‐distribution circuits, such as the rat‐race‐type directional coupler, is also demonstrated. Finally, for experimental‐validation purposes, two 920 MHz microstrip prototypes of the conceived branch‐line‐coupler‐based angular‐displacement microwave‐sensor approach are built and measured.     

A high‐gain compact circularly polarized microstrip array antenna with simplified feed network

A broadband high‐gain circularly polarized (CP) microstrip antenna operating in X band is proposed. The circular polarization property is achieved by rotating four narrow band linearly polarized (LP) microstrip patch elements in sequence. Since the conventional series‐parallel feed network is not conducive to the miniaturization of the array, a corresponding simplified feed network is designed to realize the four‐way equal power division and sequential 90° phase shift. With this feed network, the impedance bandwidth (IBW) of the CP array is greatly improved compared with that of the LP element, while maintaining a miniaturized size. Then, parasitic patches are introduced to enhance the axial ratio bandwidth (ARBW). A prototype of this antenna is fabricated and tested. The size of proposed antenna is 0.93λ₀ × 0.93λ₀ × 0.017λ₀ (λ₀ denotes the space wavelength corresponding to the center frequency 10.4 GHz). The measured 10‐dB IBW and 3‐dB ARBW are 13.6% (9.8‐11.23 GHz), 11.2% (9.9‐11.07 GHz) respectively, and peak gain in the overlapping band is 9.8 dBi.     

Balanced circularly polarized square loop antenna under even‐mode resonance

Design approach to a novel balanced, circularly polarized (CP) square loop antenna under even‐mode resonance is proposed in this paper. The loop antenna is diagonally fed by a fork‐like dipole launcher. By matching the respective natural boundary condition of the loop radiator and the dipole launcher, the resonant even‐mode with inherent CP radiation characteristic can be sufficiently excited. Both the bi‐ and uni‐directional cases are designed and investigated. A bi‐directional CP loop antenna with a 3‐dB ratio axial ratio (AR) bandwidth of 6.6% is designed at first. A uni‐directional antenna having a planar metallic reflector is further designed. The uni‐directional loop antenna exhibits excellent uni‐directional CP performance with a high front‐to‐back ratio of 40dB and a 3‐dB AR bandwidth of 7.6% in both theory and experiment.     

Metasurface cavity antenna for broadband high‐gain circularly polarized radiation

The article presents a microstrip patch (MSA) fed high gain circularly polarized metasurface cavity (CP‐MSC) antenna using a planar progressively‐phased‐reflector and a transmissive linear to circular polarization conversion metascreen. The bottom metasurface reflector consists of a remodeled Jerusalem cross to obtain 2π reflection phase variation. Linear to circular polarization conversion is achieved by a hexagonal ring based meta‐element with high transmission and bellow 3 dB axial ratio from 9.5 to 10.5 GHz. Simulated and measured results of assembled CP‐MSC antenna with MSA are in good agreement. The gain of the proposed cavity antenna with 10 and 10.5 GHz MSA are 14.9 and 16.3 dBi, respectively. Below 3 dB AR throughout the operating band denotes significant circular polarization performance of the proposed antenna.     

CPW‐fed C‐shaped slot antenna for broadband circularly polarized radiation

A novel broadband circularly polarized (CP) C‐shaped slot antenna fed by a coplanar waveguide is presented. The broadband CP operation can be achieved simply using a C‐shaped slot in the ground to produce orthogonal surface currents for left‐hand circular polarization. Using the semicircle‐shaped radiator patch, wide impedance bandwidth and broad axial‐ratio (AR) bandwidth can be obtained simultaneously. The measured results show that the proposed antenna can provide a 10‐dB impedance bandwidth of 105% from 2.78 to 8.92 GHz, and a 3‐dB AR bandwidth of 70.4% from 2.9 to 6.05 GHz. Finally, an antenna prototype with a reflector for unidirectional pattern applications is also developed. The proposed antenna has broader impedance and CP bandwidths but with a more compact size compared with the previous designs. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J RF and Microwave CAE 25:739–746, 2015.     

A polarization‐reconfigurable array design based on mode combination technique

This article reports a novel polarization‐reconfigurable antenna array using the technique of mode combination (MC). It can electronically alter its polarization states between left‐hand circular polarization mode, right‐hand circular polarization mode, and linear polarization (LP) mode. The antenna array consists of 2 × 2 microstrip antenna elements with one L‐slot on each square patch and two PIN diodes located in the slot region. Instead of degenerating circular polarization (CP) and LP modes by exciting different radiation parts of the antenna element, the LP one is combined by orthogonal CP modes generated by adjacent elements of the proposed antenna array. To verify the concept, a prototype is manufactured and tested. Experimental results show that the proposed antenna has an overlapped ?10 dB impedance bandwidth of around 11.2% for both CP modes and the LP one. The realized maximum gains are around 7.5 dB for the CP modes and 5.6 dB for the LP mode, which are satisfactory for wireless local area network in wireless communication systems.     

Isolation enhanced circularly polarized patch antenna array using modified electric‐field‐coupled resonator

A modified electric‐field‐coupled (MELC) resonator featuring negative permittivity is proposed to enhance the inter‐element isolation of a circularly polarized (CP) patch antenna array operated at Chinese compass navigation satellite system (CNSS) downlink band. The resonator comprises two capacitive gaps and a common inductive strip connected to the ground plane by two metal vias. A suspended microstrip line excitation is employed to efficiently design and investigate the MELC resonator whose constitutive parameters are subsequently extracted. A dual‐element CNSS antenna array has been prototyped and measured. The experimental results demonstrate that under the assistance of the proposed MELC resonator, a mutual coupling reduction of 15 dB has been achieved while maintaining good impedance matching and CP radiation performance. Details of the design considerations along with simulation and measurement results are presented and discussed.     

Design and development of microstrip patch antenna with circular and rectangular slot for structural health monitoring

Structural health monitoring (SHM) is the technique to identify the damage in the building or physical structures. Several structural health monitoring has been proposed in recent years. Increase in number of sensors and its wiring mechanism causes issue in signal processing demand, efficiency, and unreliability. In current state, already present sensors cannot be used for Structural Health Monitoring because of its high cost and low battery capacity, although none of these techniques are capable of monitoring the condition of complex physical structures. The measurement of strain can be done by using patch antenna as strain sensors. In currently available sensors only the wireless range. The main objective of this paper is to investigate the feasibility of using circular and rectangular slotted microstrip patch antenna as a strain sensor for structural health monitoring without these afore mentioned problems. These antenna sensors’ (slotted rectangular and circular microstrip patch antennas) simulation results are confirmed. From the simulation results, the sensor provides information about crack orientation.     

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     

A dual‐band dual‐polarized cubical DRA coupled with new modified cross‐shaped slot for ISM (2.4 GHz) and Wi‐MAX (3.3‐3.6 GHz) band applications

In this article, a new modified cross‐shaped coupled cubical dielectric resonator antenna (DRA) has been investigated for dual‐band dual‐polarized applications. The linearly polarized (LP) fields in DRA has been generated by using a single slot in the ground plane and kept at either 45° (S_L1) or ?45° (S_L2) from the microstrip feed line. Combining these two slots (S_L1 and S_L2) in the modified ground plane, the proposed structure able to generate circularly polarized (CP) field in DRA. But the generated CP field is not enough to cover ISM 2400 band. To achieve CP in ISM 2400 band, an extra slot (S_L3) to the existing slots and an extra strip (S_T) in the circular ring feed line have been included. This modified final antenna arrangement has been able to produce LP (due to loading effect, ie, slot and DRA) and CP fields (orthogonal modes have been generated, ie, TE ^x₁₁₁ and TE ^y₁₁₁), simultaneously. The measured CP and LP, ?10 dB impedance bandwidths are 11.85% (2.38‐2.68 GHz) and 9.11% (3.25‐3.56 GHz) in combination with the 3‐dB axial ratio bandwidth of 4.11% (2.38‐2.48 GHz). The generated CP and LP fields are used for different wireless communication bands such as ISM 2400 and Wi‐MAX (3.3‐3.7 GHz) bands.     

In‐pixel temperature sensor for high‐luminance active matrix micro‐light‐emitting diode display using low‐temperature polycrystalline silicon and oxide thin‐film‐transistors

We propose an in‐pixel temperature sensor using low‐temperature polycrystalline silicon and oxide (LTPO) thin‐film transistor (TFTs) for high‐luminance active matrix (AM) micro‐light‐emitting diode (LED) displays. By taking advantage of the different off‐current characteristics of p‐type LTPS TFTs and n‐type a‐IGZO TFTs under temperature change, we designed and fabricated a temperature sensor consists of only LTPO TFTs without additional sensing component or material. The fabricated sensor exhibits excellent temperature sensitivity of up to 71.8 mV/°C. In addition, a 64 × 64 temperature sensor array with 3T sensing pixel and integrated gate driver has also been fabricated, which demonstrates potential approach for maxing out the performance of high‐luminance AM micro‐LED display with real‐time in‐pixel temperature monitoring.     

A compact double‐layer wideband circularly polarized microstrip antenna with parasitic elements

In this article, a new broadband circularly polarized (CP) microstrip patch antenna (MPA) with a sequential phase (SP) square‐loop feeding structure is proposed. The presented antenna is composed of a square‐loop feeding structure, four L‐shaped parasitic patches with L‐shaped slots, four parasitic square patches, and a corner‐truncated square patch. At first, a SP square‐loop is designed as a feeding structure. Then, four L‐shaped parasitic patches with L‐shaped slots are utilized to generate one CP mode by a capacitive coupled way. At last, four parasitic square patches and a corner‐truncated square patch are together placed above the SP feeding structure to broaden the circularly polarized bandwidth (CPBW). The presented antenna has a wide 3‐dB axial ratio bandwidth (ARBW) of 16.7% (5.4 GHz, 4.95‐5.85 GHz), and a wide 10‐dB return loss bandwidth of 25.5% (5.5 GHz, 4.8‐6.2 GHz). The proposed antenna features compact structure and broad 3‐AR bandwidth which could completely cover the WLAN (5.725‐5.85GHz) band. Therefore, the proposed antenna is suitable for circular polarization applications in C band.     

Spoof surface plasmon polariton‐fed circularly polarized leaky‐wave antenna with suppressed side‐lobe levels

A wide‐angle scanning circularly polarized (CP) leaky‐wave antenna (LWA) with suppressed side‐lobe levels (SLLs) is proposed, which can be a good candidate for future radar and wireless communication systems. The LWA consists of 12 cross slotted elliptical patch elements, which are fed by a microstrip spoof surface plasmon polariton (SSPP) line. Two fundamental modes of the patch array with two orthogonal polarizations can be excited by the electromagnetic coupling between the array and the SSPP line. By optimizing the elliptical eccentricity e and etching cross slots on the elliptical patch array, a 90° phase difference is introduced, and then, the CP radiation is realized. A tapered aperture field distribution is also realized by adjusting coupling intensities between the patch elements and the SSPP line, which is beneficial to reduce the SLLs. The electrical size of the LWA is 1.29λ₀ × 6.02λ₀ × 0.08λ₀, where λ₀ is air wavelength at 12.9 GHz (broadside direction). Both the simulated and measured results indicate that the CP operating band is 12.0 to 15.0 GHz. The proposed CP LWA scans continuously from ?14° to 38°. In the whole operating band, the axial ratios are less than 3 dB, and the SLLs are less than ?20 dB as well.     

Gain enhancement of circularly polarized antenna with dual‐polarization conversion transmitarray

A dual‐polarization conversion transmitarray is proposed for a circularly polarized (CP) transmitarray antenna. The designed transmitarray realizes the polarization conversion and gain enhancement for the circular polarization incident wave. The transmitarray can transform the left‐hand circularly polarization (LHCP) wave and the right hand circularly polarization (RHCP) wave into RHCP and LHCP waves, respectively. Two CP patch antennas are designed as source antennas to illuminate the transmitarray and form the transmitarray antenna. The experimental and simulation results show that the designed transmitarray realizes the polarization conversation and the gain enhancement for two CP antennas indeed.     

Dual‐band circularly polarized MIMO DRA for sub‐6 GHz applications

In this article, a dual‐band circularly polarized multiple‐input‐multiple‐output (MIMO) dielectric resonator antenna (DRA) is proposed for 3.5 and 5.5 GHz bands, both being located under 6 GHz. Known as sub‐6 (or as mid‐band), they provide good coverage and capacity in the newly targeted fifth‐generation (5G) systems. The proposed structure consists of two ring DRAs (RDRAs) etched on a 0.8 mm thick RT Duroid substrate. Measured impedance bandwidths in broadside direction are 3.1‐3.75 GHz (19%) and 5.3‐5.6 GHz (9.4%) and circular polarization (CP) bandwidths are 3.425‐3.6 GHz (5%) and 5.45‐5.55 GHz (2%), respectively. CP is achieved by exciting HE modes using two probes placed orthogonaly to each other, that is, at an azimuthal angular distance of 90^° . Varying the lengths of the probe allows achieving the necessary time‐phase quadrature between modes. Comparison between recent multiband circularly polarized MIMO DRAs and proposed prototype has revealed that CP bandwidth in both bands is one of the highlighting advantages of the present configuration.     

Single‐feed wideband circularly polarized patch antenna using dual mode defected ground waveguide coupling structure

A dual mode square‐ring defected ground waveguide (SR‐DGW) with defected square patch is first proposed to excite a single‐feed dual mode circularly polarized (CP) patch antenna, which can improve the impedance bandwidth and achieve the CP radiation pattern. The defected square patch is called the perturbation element. By optimizing the size of the perturbation, the degenerate modes of the dual mode SR‐DGW are split and their orthogonal modes can be excited simultaneously. Due to the dual mode of the SR‐DGW, the TM₀₁ mode, and TM₁₀ mode of the square patch antenna are excited simultaneously, which can improve the impedance bandwidth of the antenna. Meanwhile, owing to the orthogonal modes, CP radiation pattern of the antenna is obtained. Then, for a better impedance matching, an L‐shaped spurline embedded in the feedline is introduced. The simulated and measured results show a good performance of the proposed antenna. The measured ?10 dB impedance bandwidth is 10.4% (3.56 GHz‐3.95 GHz). The measured 3 dB axial ratio bandwidth is 5.36% (3.63 GHz‐3.83 GHz). Detailed designs and experiments are described and discussed.     

Broadband circularly polarized Fabry‐Perot antenna utilizing Archimedean spiral radiator and multi‐layer partially reflecting surface

This article presents a method to design broadband circularly polarized (CP) Fabry‐Perot Resonator (FPR) antenna. The proposed antenna is based on multi‐layer thin dielectric slabs arranged in close proximity as a partially reflecting surface (PRS) and an Archimedean spiral as a CP radiating source. Experimental results show a broadband operation from 6 to 13 GHz, in which the reflection coefficient is less than ?10 dB and the axial ratio (AR) is lower than 3 dB. In addition, good radiation patterns and high broadside gain of better than 10.8 dBic are achieved over the operating bandwidth. The proposed antenna can be used for C‐ and X‐band satellite communications.     

Low‐profile UHF RFID reader antenna with CP radiation and coupled feeding technique

A low profile annular‐ring patch antenna with circularly polarized (CP) radiation for radio frequency identification (RFID) reader applications in the ultra‐high frequency (UHF) band (922‐928 MHz) is presented in this article. Perturbation method is applied by loading a pair of triangular open‐notch into the outer circumference of ring patch, and good impedance matching can be determined by using the coupled feeding technique. The overall size of this proposed antenna is 150 mm × 150 mm × 10.4 mm. The measured results show desirable 10‐dB impedance bandwidth and 3‐dB axial ratio (AR) bandwidth of 3.5% (908‐941 MHz) and 0.65% (922‐928 MHz), respectively. Stable antenna peak gain and efficiency of 7.2 dBic and 87% are also exhibited, respectively.     

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.     

Broadband circularly polarized printed falcate‐shaped monopole antenna

In this study, a simple broadband circularly polarized (CP) printed monopole antenna for S/C‐band applications is proposed. The CP antenna is composed of a falcate‐shaped monopole with a right‐angle trapezoid stub, then wide impedance and axial ratio (AR) bandwidths are achieved. By placing one rectangular split‐ring resonator above the stub for generating upper CP mode, both of impedance and CP performances are further improved. The proposed antenna is fabricated on a FR4 substrate and measured. The measured ?10‐dB impedance bandwidth is 107%, ranging from 2.4‐7.9 GHz, and the measured 3‐dB AR bandwidth is 94% (2.4‐6.6 GHz), covering the entire wireless local area network (WLAN) and WiMAX bands.