Normally, the reported gain of the microstrip patch antenna is within 8 dBi. Using properly located three shorting pins on three bisectors, the present work reports a method to convert the non-radiating TM11 mode of equilateral triangular patch antennas (ETPAs) to a deformed TM11 radiating mode. The boresight gain of ETPA operating in TM11 mode is enhanced from −10.75 to 12.1 dBi at 5.43 GHz. The boresight measured gain is further enhanced to 14.2 dBi at 5.52 GHz by using a triangular surface-mounted short horn (SMSH) of about ${{\lambda }}/5$ height. The aperture efficiency of the ETPA with the shorting pins is 84.2%. The aperture efficiency is further improved to 94.2% using the SMSH. The measured boresight cross-polarization and side-lobe level are −40 and −29 dB, respectively. The nature of the electricfield and surface current distribution is analyzed, using both the characteristic mode analysis method and high-frequency structure simulator, to understand the role of shorting pin and coaxial feed in converting the non-radiating TM11 mode to the radiating mode. A systematic design process also is presented for a fast design of shorting pin-loaded ETPA on the suitable substrate at a specified frequency.

Basically, a 4 × 4 Butler matrix (BM) connected to an antenna array allows to have four beams, each oriented in a specific direction depending on the excitation port. In this paper, an almost continuously steerable beam system based on a conventional 4 × 4 BM with adjustable phase shift is presented and demonstrated. Here, varicap diodes are used instead of an additional phase shifter. Under different bias levels applied to the couplers throughout these varicap diodes, an output variable phase difference was obtained. A prototype of the proposed tunable BM integrated with an antenna array operating at 3.5 GHz was fabricated and tested. The experimental results show a good agreement with those simulated. A reflection and isolation coefficient better than −15 dB over the entire desired frequency band and an amplitude imbalance lower than ±1.5 dB were achieved. The measured radiating beam under different DC biasing can be oriented from ±6° to ±18° when port 1 or 4 is excited and oriented from ±32° to ±43° for ports 2 and 3.

This article presents an innovative design for a low-profile, high-gain circularly polarized (CP) antenna using a single-layer metasurface (MTS). The proposed design incorporates an MTS layer, comprising a 4 × 4 array of hexagonal-shaped patches, printed on the top layer of the substrate. The bottom layer features a coplanar waveguide-fed slotted ground. Circular polarization and broadside radiation are achieved through the application of characteristic mode analysis (CMA). CMA is employed to simultaneously excite desired modes, aiming for wideband circular polarization and gain enhancement. Experimental results validate the effectiveness of the design, with compact dimensions of 0.67λ0 × 0.67λ0 × 0.04λ0. The measurements demonstrate an impressive impedance bandwidth of 84.3% within the 3.7–9.1 GHz. Additionally, a 3-dB axial ratio bandwidth of 18.6% is observed between 4.96 and 5.98 GHz and 3.74% between 8.38 and 8.7 GHz. The antenna exhibits excellent radiation pattern characteristics, featuring a maximum gain of 10.08 dBi at 7.1 GHz. The radiation pattern is symmetrical with broadside directionality, making the antenna well-suited for sensing applications.

A compact quasi-Yagi antenna with a modified ground plane is designed for a through-wall radar on-chip. A slot-based ground plane modification in the proposed antenna results in significant miniaturization with an increase in the impedance bandwidth by 44.62%. The antenna has a high directivity of 9.02 dBi and a front-to-back ratio of 25.76 dB at 2.4 GHz. Based on experiments in real-world deployment scenarios, the performance of the proposed quasi-Yagi antenna is found to be comparable to that of a Vivaldi antenna and a commercial-off-the-shelf horn antenna. Spectrogram-based signatures of a moving person behind a wooden partition and a 40 cm thick masonry wall are successfully obtained using the designed antenna, demonstrating the suitability of the quasi-Yagi antenna for portable applications using a radar-on-chip.

In this paper, we propose a novel method for obtaining wideband spectral information of the target in microwave imaging systems by using broadband frequency reconfigurable printed transceivers. The proposed transceiver is composed of two embedded stacked microstrip antenna configurations operating in C-band (5.5–8.5 GHz) and X-band (8.5–11.5 GHz) with each having 3 GHz bandwidth. The transceiver switches between the two configurations (and thus frequency bands) using PIN diodes and collects response of the antenna in the presence of the target, in both the operating bands. This information is then combined to obtain wideband spectral information of the target from 5.5 to 11.5 GHz to achieve improved image reconstruction. The proposed reconfigurable transceiver has advantage over traditional broadband transceivers (those have slots/meandering at ground plane to achieve wideband response) that it has unidirectional radiation patterns throughout its band of operation. Hence the imaging system is implemented without the absorbers. This keeps the system compact and inconspicuous when installed for security applications. Here, a bistatic system is employed with two-dimensional target scanning performed in a real outdoor environment.

An innovative and simple method for attaining broadband frequency reconfigurable antenna structure is presented using low-cost materials and a compact design. The frequency reconfigurability is attained by the “OFF” and “ON” mechanisms of three PIN diodes. Many performance observations are carried out such as reflectance coefficient, bandwidth (BW), resonance frequency, electric field, feed position variation, and gain among different configurations. The suitability of the presented work for the different applications lies in the X frequency band. The resonating frequency for all switch OFF modes is achieved at 13.2 GHz and one switch ON mode at 10.7 GHz. The proposed design yields the frequency tunability behavior over the broadband of 2.5 GHz. The design yields the directivity of 5.58 dB, the minimum reflectance coefficient of −17.27 dB, and a total gain of 3.87 dB. This design offers an electric field of 46 558 v/m, a BW of 340 MHz, and a normalized directivity of 87° using low-cost substrates. The results of the presented design were also fabricated and related to simulated results. Performance observation of the proposed work with previously published research work is also included. The presented design provides the solution of the low-cost, compact, reconfigurable antennas, which can be used for next-generation communication systems.

A new type of closed square ring decoupling structure is proposed in this letter, which can effectively reduce the coupling of antennas. The designed antenna is composed of two elliptical monopoles and a common ground loaded with a broadband parasitic decoupling structure. Considering the impedance matching, each antenna element is changed from the original rectangular microstrip feed to a tapered microstrip feed and etched a circular slot on the elliptical monopole patch. By comparison with the original antenna without any decoupling structure, through loading the broadband decoupling structure on the ground, the antenna isolation is improved by 10 dB in most frequency bands. Comparing simulation and measurement results, the antenna achieves better than 25 dB isolation over the whole operating band (3.3–12 GHz). By manufacturing and testing the antenna designed in this article, the excellent performance parameters obtained also prove that the antenna can be used in portable devices.

In this study, a dipole antenna is designed for real-time damage assessment, humidity, and temperature monitoring in reinforced and non-reinforced concrete structures. The antenna-based sensor is embedded into reinforced and non-reinforced concrete beams to assess electromagnetic measurements. Reflection parameter S11 in dB values and resonant frequencies of the embedded antenna are evaluated to detect damage, humidity, and temperature changes. The exploratory results show that as deformation increases in reinforced concrete, resonance frequency values decrease and S11 values increase. The load and resonance frequency values showed very close trends as deformation increases in the beam. In water content sensing experiments, the S11 in dB values of the antenna decrease as the humidity increases for concrete specimens while the resonance frequency values increase as the humidity increases for the reinforced concrete specimen. Elevated temperature sensing experimental results show that the resonance frequency values of the antenna decrease as the temperature of the specimen increases for concrete specimens while the S11 in dB values increase as the temperature of the specimen increases for reinforced concrete specimen.

This article presents the design of an ultra-compact cavity-backed self-diplexing antenna with high isolation employing quarter-mode substrate integrated waveguide (QMSIW). The proposed antenna is constructed by using QMSIW, slot, and two 50Ω feed lines. Two eighth-mode cavity resonators are designed by inserting a slot on the top side of the rectangular substrate integrated waveguide to operate at 2.6 and 4.9 GHz for long-term evolution and public safety band applications, respectively. The proposed design allows to tune any frequency band independently by keeping other bands unaltered. The size of antenna is ultra-compact, due to the use of QMSIW cavity. The isolation between two ports is >35 dB. The antenna achieves 5.34 and 5.68 dBi peak gains at 2.6 and 4.9 GHz, respectively. The efficiency of the antenna is >85% at both frequency bands. The antenna provides more than 20.9 dB front-to-back-ratio and better than 21 dB separation between co-to-cross polarization levels. The designed antenna is validated through fabrication and measurement.

In this paper, a low profile 4 × 4 multiple input and multiple output (MIMO) antenna is proposed and designed for wireless local area network (WLAN) application using a square split-ring resonator. Initially, a single square-patch antenna is designed with square-shaped split-ring slot. Subsequently, the two-element MIMO antenna is designed and it is extended to four-element MIMO antenna. Finally, the defected ground structure (DGS) is implemented in order to enhance antenna performance. The antenna elements are placed opposite to each other. The mutual coupling between the antennas elements is reduced by DGS. The proposed single, two and four-element antennas operate at 5.8 GHz for WLAN. The overall performance is measured in terms of S parameter, radiation pattern, and envelope correlation coefficient. The simulated results are verified through measurements. The simulated and measured results demonstrate that the proposed 4 × 4 MIMO antenna is the most suitable for WLAN applications.

This paper presents a low-profile multi-slotted patch antenna for long term evolution (LTE) and fifth-generation (5G) communication applications. The studied antenna comprised of a stepped patch and a ground plane. To attain the required operating band, three slots have been inserted within the patch. The insertion of the slots enhances the capacitive effect and helps the prototype antenna to achieve an operating band ranging from 3.15 to 5.55 GHz (S11 ≤−10 dB), covering the N77/N78/N79 for sub-6 GHz 5G wireless communications and LTE bands of 22/42/43/46. The wideband antenna presented in this paper offers omnidirectional stable radiation patterns, good gains, and efficiency with a compact size which make this design an ideal contender for wireless fidelity (WiFi), wireless local area network (WLAN), LTE, and sub-6 GHz 5G communication applications.

In this paper, a simple and efficient method to increase the gain and bandwidth of the wearable antennas used in several medical/communications systems is presented. To increase the gain and bandwidth simultaneously, the triple transmission lines (TTLs) method has been used. With this method, the frequency ranges of 1.7–2.5 and 5.4–5.95 GHz are covered with dual-band responses. Also, the simulated maximum gain at 2 and 5.8 GHz is equal to 8.26 and 9.86 dB, respectively. Using the TTLs method, the second frequency band (5.4–5.95 GHz) is achieved. Also, the gain improvement in operating frequencies is more than 4 dB compared to the conventional antenna. The dimensions of the proposed wearable high-gain antenna are 80 × 92 × 2 mm3 or 0.57 × 0.67 × 0.01 λg3 at 2 GHz. Finally, a dual-band sample antenna for use in medical systems was fabricated with a flexible felt substrate and its characteristics were measured. There is a good fit between the measurement and simulation results.

A novel dual-polarization, single-layer reflectarray has been designed and manufactured to operate at receive (20 GHz) and transmit (30 GHz) frequencies for Ka-band terminal antennas. The reflectarray unit cell is composed of several types of resonant elements printed on the upper side of a conductor-backed substrate, which are designed to produce a collimated beam at 20 and 30 GHz in dual polarization. Cross-shaped loops are used to provide the required phases at 20 GHz, while crossed dipoles and modified truncated rings are used to control the phasing at 30 GHz. The resonant lengths of the proposed elements have been adjusted cell by cell by means of a two-dimensional interpolation method to achieve the required phase shift at each frequency. Two different feeds have been used to illuminate the reflectarray at 20 and 30 GHz. The measured gain is 28.02 dBi at 20 GHz and 32.14 dBi at 30 GHz. The measurement results show that the radiation patterns of the designed single-layer reflectarray antenna are in good agreement with those achieved from the simulations.

In this work, a new compact, low profile, frequency, and end-fire pattern reconfigurable antenna is presented. The proposed antenna consists of four parasitic elements and an electric-inductive-capacitive (ELC) resonator enclosed with a closed ring resonator (CRR). The reconfigurability in the proposed antenna is achieved with the help of five PIN diodes (D1–D5) embedded on the top surface of the substrate. The diode (D1) is implanted between ELC and CRR resonators for frequency reconfigurability. The other four diodes (D2–D5) are implanted between the ground plane and four parasitic elements to control the electrical length of the ground plane to achieve pattern diversity. The ground plane and parasitic elements steer the primary omni-directional beam to bi-directional and uni-directional end-fire radiation at multiple frequencies. The proposed antenna exhibits multiband operation and end-fire pattern diversity depending upon the different states of PIN diodes. The overall size of the proposed antenna is 0.20λ0× 0.17λ0× 0.009λ0, where λ0 is calculated at the lowest resonance frequency. The impedance bandwidth of the antenna ranges from 1.45 to 26.22%, while peak gain varies from 0.86 to 3.86 dBi depending upon the state of operation. The measured results are in agreement with the simulated results, which confirm the frequency and pattern diversity performance of the antenna. The proposed antenna can be used in back-to-back repeater systems.

The paper presents a new coplanar waveguide (CPW)-fed rectangular patch antenna with a square-shaped ground plane that can be employed in modern advanced navigation systems. For realizing broad impedance bandwidth in the proposed antenna, a wide slot is introduced in the square ground plane and the rectangular patch is shifted toward the left edge of the ground surface. In addition, by means of introducing square-shaped stubs near the left and right edge of the ground plane, the circular polarization is achieved at L1, L2, and L5 satellite bands. As per the simulation results, the proposed antenna provides a wide impedance bandwidth (S11<−10 dB) of 123% (1.12–4.72 GHz) and 3 dB axial ratio bandwidth of 11% (1.15–1.29 GHz) and 18% (1.5–1.8 GHz) suitable for multipurpose wireless applications. The designed single feed circularly polarized antenna is low profile, small size, light weight and easily integrable with other high-frequency communication devices. To validate radiation performance of the proposed structure, the antenna is fabricated and integrated with the commercially available Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver and it is found that the measured values are in close agreement with the desired results.

A compact planar ultra-wideband (UWB) antenna with WiMAX and WLAN notched band is presented in this paper. The presented antenna consists of a rectangular patch and slotted partial ground plane and fed by a microstrip feed line. The volumetric size of the antenna is 30 mm × 22 mm × 1.6 mm. Method of moment-based simulation technology is used to simulate and analyze the characteristics of the antenna. To generate two notch bands at WiMAX and WLAN, a pair of parasitic resonator is placed beneath the radiating patch. The presented antenna achieves an operating band (VSWR ≤2) ranging from 2.98 to 12 GHz with an average gain of 3.95 dBi along with considerable efficiency and symmetric radiation patterns. Moreover, the antenna exhibits two notch bands at 3.5 and 5.45 GHz and is able to avoid possible interference with pre-existing narrow band services. The proposed antenna is low cost and low profile and is modeled to be used as a transceiver in UWB communication applications.

A compact coplanar waveguide (CPW)-fed circular polarization (CP)-antenna for new generation applications with dual bands filtering performance along with CP feature based on unit-cell semi-fractal is proposed in this paper. The CP-antenna privileges from semi-fractal radiator causes to have a miniaturized size. The stopped bands are designed to suppress the interference with present WLAN and ITU-R satellite systems. These properties are obtained by embedding semi-fractal unit-cell patterns stubs at the radiator and applying two rectangular-shaped slits inside CPW ground plane and a pair of grounded L-shaped strips. By introducing the first step of semi-fractal strips, and the mirrored defected ground surface structures, dual-band rejection functionality at WLAN (5–6 GHz) and ITU-R (7.725–8.5 GHz) are practically obtained. Besides that, semi-fractal strips results to two orthogonal modes stimulation on the radiator and CP attribute are obtained at WiMAX (3.1–3.7 GHz). CP-antenna presents omni-directional radiation H-plane patterns over the applicational frequency band. The CP-antennas size is 25 mm × 25 mm and fabricated on commercially available FR4-epoxy substrate with 1 mm thickness. Measured results illustrate that the proposed ultimate CP-antenna with miniaturized structure, efficient impedance tuning characteristics, and adequate radiation performances is the best choice for new generation of wireless communications.