This paper presents a systematic design approach for developing a semiflexible multiple-input–multiple-output antenna system operating in the millimeter wave frequency spectrum, specifically designed for body-worn applications in biotechnologies. The designed antenna features dual flower-shaped antenna radiators placed in a spatial diversity configuration. Strategic modifications have been implemented by integrating dual crescent-shaped slots in the ground layer to attain the targeted frequency band of 25.7–30.6 GHz. Later, the upper edge of the ground plane is truncated in order to achieve circularly polarized radiation characteristics at 29.4 GHz with 3 dB ARBW of 0.6 GHz (29.1–29.7 GHz). The realization of circular polarization in the antenna geometry is validated through the analysis of characteristic mode theory. A maximum gain of 5.6 dBi is attained along with a port isolation of >30 dB. The proposed antenna undergoes analysis to assess its performance in the bending conditions and specific absorption rate, besides validation of diversity metrics encompassing envelope correlation coefficient, diversity gain, channel capacity loss, total active reflection coefficient, and mean effective gain has also been conducted. Finally, the proposed antenna structure is fabricated, and its performance is validated and subsequently compared with that of its simulated counterpart.

This research work presents an implantable antenna that operates at 5.8 GHz. By using a radiator with a loop-based design, the antenna can be made smaller. Radiator is made up of three connected rectangular loops. On the substrate’s back side, an I-shaped ground plane is used. As substrate and superstrate, polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) with dimensions of 7 mm × 5 mm × 0.3 mm is used. The conducting sections are made using copper foil that is 30 µm thick. The suggested antenna is examined by the implantable medical device using realistic human scalp phantom models and a homogenous skin box. Simulated study revealed that it operates around 5.8 GHz with a bandwidth from 5.69 to 5.92 GHz. The specific absorption rate was 0.28 and 0.26 W/kg for skin box and human scalp phantoms, respectively, at 1 mW input power across 1 g volume tissue.

A rectangular monopole antenna with an extended ground, excited by Coplanar Waveguide (CPW) and backed by a 6 × 6 array of fractal artificial magnetic conductor (AMC) unit cells, resonating at 5.8 GHz in Industrial, Scientific, and Medical (ISM) band, is presented in this manuscript. To attain the objective of proposing a compact and economical antenna solution for employment in wearable biomedical domain, a novel approach of utilizing both surfaces of the same dielectric for engraving antenna element as well as AMC array is adopted. It results in the elimination of layers of expensive substrate (RO3003) and of thick separator (foam) between antenna and AMC array. During measurement in open space, the proposed antenna system exhibited an impedance bandwidth of 570 MHz with a gain of 7.9 dBi. While a total realized gain of 7.5 dBi, amounting to a gain enhancement of about 3 dB as compared to that of monopole alone, is observed when the integrated antenna system is placed just over a three-layer rectangular human body equivalent model. Specific absorption rate values, as calculated at 5.8 GHz and averaged over 1 and 10 g of human tissue, are 0.0117 and 0.00244 W/kg, respectively. Obtained results strongly advocate the use of the proposed antenna system in smart wearable healthcare devices.

This article presents a flexible wearable KIT monopole antenna for biomedical application. A metamaterial unit cell is proposed to improve the antenna performance. The proposed antenna and the metamaterial are fabricated on 1 mm-thick polydimethylsiloxane substrate to operate in the ISM frequency band of 2.45 GHz. Integration of the metamaterial improves the gain and reduces the specific absorption rate (SAR) of the antenna. The overall dimension of the antenna with the metamaterial is 49 × 49 × 19 mm3. The designed antenna is investigated for the loading effect of the body by placing on the hand phantom model. Bending tolerances are also analyzed for x and y direction with various bend radii. Gain and SAR of the proposed antenna are 4.61 dBi and 0.868 W/kg. The results of the fabricated prototype show that the proposed wearable antenna is safe for biomedical applications.

The main interest in using synthetic aperture radar (SAR) technology in automotive scenarios is that arbitrarily long arrays can be synthesized by exploiting the natural motion of the ego vehicle, enabling finer azimuth resolution and improved detection. All of this is achieved without increasing the hardware complexity in terms of the number of physical antennas. In this paper, we start by discussing the application of SAR imaging in the automotive environment from both theoretical and experimental perspectives. We proceed by describing an efficient processing workflow and we derive the rough number of operations required to focus an image proving the real-time imaging capability of the system. The experimental results are based on open road data acquired using an eight-channel radar at 77 GHz, considering side-looking SAR and forward SAR. The results confirm the idea that SAR imaging can be successfully and routinely used for high-resolution mapping of urban environments in the near future.

This paper presents a pattern diversity UWB antenna for Wireless Body Area Network (WBAN) communications. Pattern diversity antenna comprises two antenna elements with directional and omnidirectional patterns suitable for off-body and on-body communications respectively. Several broad-banding techniques such as Co-Planar waveguide, parasitic patches, and cavity resonant techniques are incorporated in microstrip antenna to achieve an ultra-wideband of 7.5 GHz (3.1 to 10.6 GHz) with a directional pattern. Monopole radiator topology is utilized to achieve a UWB frequency range of 2.6–10.6 GHz with an omnidirectional pattern. Pattern diversity is achieved using an orthogonal arrangement of the antenna elements in a compact size of 40 mm × 34 mm, maintaining the isolation >20 dB between the antennas. Gain varies from 2.2 to 4.6 dBi and 2.5 to 7.5 dBi for omnidirectional and directional antenna respectively. The simulated radiation efficiency for the directional antenna and the omnidirectional antenna are 74–86% and 52–66.5% respectively. The proposed design provides a good diversity performance in the entire UWB bandwidth with ECC<0.1 and a diversity gain of approximately 10 dB. SAR impact evaluated under various conditions is found to be <1.6 W/Kg for 1 gram of tissue.

All textile integrated dual-band monopole antenna with an artificial magnetic conductor (AMC) is proposed. The proposed design operates at 2.4 and 5.8 GHz for wearable medical applications to monitor the heartbeat. A flexible and low-profile E- shaped CPW dual-band textile antenna is integrated with a 4 × 4 dual-band textile AMC reflector to enhance the gain and specific absorption rate (SAR). The SAR is reduced by nearly 95% at both 1 and 10 g. The design was measured on the body with a 2 mm separation. The simulated and measured results appear in high agreement in the case of with and without AMC array integration. The measurement was performed in the indoor environment and in an anechoic chamber to validate the design based on reflection coefficient and radiation pattern measurements.

A dual-band 10-port multiple input multiple output (MIMO) antenna array for 5G smartphone is proposed. Each antenna in the MIMO system can work from 3.4 to 3.6 GHz and 5 to 6 GHz with 10 dB (2:1 VSWR) impedance bandwidth. Nevertheless, for a 3:1 VSWR, the antenna operates from 3.3 to 3.8 GHz and 4.67 to 6.24 GHz. The MIMO system is formed by making 10 seven-shaped coupled fed slot antenna elements excited at two different resonant modes and integrated into the system circuit board. By implementing the spatial and polarization diversity techniques, high isolation better than 28 dB between any pair of antenna elements is achieved. The proposed 10-port MIMO antenna array is fabricated and measured. Significant radiation efficiency is obtained, ranging from 65 to 82% for both bands. The antenna gain in the required operating band is substantial, around 3–3.8 dBi. Further, the MIMO parameters such as envelope correlation co-efficient, channel capacity, and total active reflection co-efficient are calculated. The antenna's robustness is estimated by analyzing the user hand effects and specific absorption rate (SAR). The measured results are well agreed with the simulated results.

Recent regional cooling has impacted the natural systems of the Antarctic Peninsula (AP); however, little is known concerning the changes in the high parts of the glacial systems. Dry-snow line (DSL), situated in the high parts of glaciers, is the uppermost limit of frequent or occasional surface melt. We analyse dry-snow line altitude (DSLA) changes on the AP during 2004–2020 using C-band synthetic aperture radar time series data. We demonstrate that the DSLA in the eastern part of the AP is usually higher than that of the western part. Moreover, using simulated climatic variables from regional climate models, the lowering in altitude of DSL of glaciers in most areas is identified as a response to a decrease in snowmelt and an increase in precipitation. Furthermore, correlation analyses between simulated climatic variables and the DSLA are conducted. These results present the sensitive response of variations in DSLA to meteorological conditions, and the capability of DSLA being a proxy of polar local climate in high-altitude areas with no in situ meteorological observations.

This work presents the implementation of a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) at 77 GHz, for automotive applications. This implementation is unique in the sense that it is a radar-only solution for most use-cases. The set-up consists of two radar sensors, one to calculate the ego trajectory and the second for SAR measurements. Thus the need for expensive GNSS-based dead reckoning systems, which are in any case not accurate enough to fulfill the requirements for SAR, is eliminated. The results presented here have been obtained from a SAR implementation which is able to deliver processed images in a matter of seconds from the point where the targets were measured. This has been accomplished using radar sensors which will be commercially available in the near future. Hence the results are easily reproducible since the deployed radars are not special research prototypes. The successful widespread use of SAR in the automotive industry will be a large step forward toward developing automated parking functions which will be far superior to today's systems based on ultrasound sensors and radar (short range) beam-forming algorithms. The same short-range radar can be used for SAR, and the ultrasound sensors can thus be completely omitted from the vehicle.

Global warming is causing glaciers in the Caucasus Mountains and around the world to lose mass at an accelerated pace. As a result of this rapid retreat, significant parts of the glacierized surface area can be covered with debris deposits, often making them indistinguishable from the surrounding land surface by optical remote-sensing systems. Here, we present the DebCovG-carto toolbox to delineate debris-covered and debris-free glacier surfaces from non-glacierized regions. The algorithm uses synthetic aperture radar-derived coherence images and the normalized difference snow index applied to optical satellite data. Validating the remotely-sensed boundaries of Ushba and Chalaati glaciers using field GPS data demonstrates that the use of pairs of Sentinel-1 images (2019) from identical ascending and descending orbits can substantially improve debris-covered glacier surface detection. The DebCovG-carto toolbox leverages multiple orbits to automate the mapping of debris-covered glacier surfaces. This new automatic method offers the possibility of quickly correcting glacier mapping errors caused by the presence of debris and makes automatic mapping of glacierized surfaces considerably faster than the use of other subjective methods.

A planar rectangular slot antenna with dual-band operation and realized higher peak gain is proposed, designed, and fabricated for sub-6 GHz 5G applications. The antenna possesses a rectangular radiating slot with the inverted stub on its upper edge excited simultaneously by a micro-strip feed line having a double folded T-shaped structure. The fabricated design is of compact size with the radiating portion of 0.3 λ0 × 0.17 λ0 (λ0 represents free-space wavelength) and profile of 0.009 λ0. The measured results show the operating frequency bands of 3.29–3.63 GHz and 4.3–5.2 GHz, with a peak gain of around 7.17 dBi. The higher frequency band is generated by the feed patch and the slot whereas lower resonant frequency band is generated by the stub loaded on the slot. The measured results are in a good agreement with the simulated results. The proposed design is suitable for the International Telecommunications Union sub 6 GHz applications.

This paper presents a novel approach for the determination of True-Speed-Over-Ground for trains. Speed determination is accomplished by correlating the received signals of two side-looking radar sensors. The theoretically achievable precision is derived. Test measurements are done in two different scenarios to give a proof of concept. Thereafter a series of field measurements is performed to rate the practical suitability of the approach. The results of the measurements are thoroughly evaluated. The test and field measurements are carried out using a 24 GHz frequency modulated continuous wave radar.

In this paper, a flexible CPW fed ultrawide band (UWB) antenna with mu-negative (MNG) metamaterial is designed, fabricated, and tested for wearable applications. Initially, a UWB antenna of size 50 mm × 43 mm is fabricated on two different substrates, viz. flexible FR4 and semi-flexible Rogers RT/duroid 5880. A metamaterial structure fabricated on flexible FR4 shows a magnetic resonance from 7.2 GHz to 9.2 GHz with maximum stop band attenuation (−49 dB) and high MNG value (−2121.6) at 7.87 GHz. Then a (3 × 3) array of designed MNG metasurface is used as ground plane with flexible UWB antenna, which improves its overall gain and radiation pattern. The performance of the flexible antenna with/without metamaterial at various distances from flat and cylindrical three-layered human phantom of skin, fat, and muscle is studied. Further, the bending characteristics at different angles and performance over thin metallic sheet is also evaluated. Additionally, the peak specific absorption rate value averaged over 1 g of tissue at three chosen frequencies from UWB range (3, 5, 10 GHz) with/without metamaterial using 0.3 and 0.1 W of input power is also analyzed. The simulated and measured results are in good agreement which confirms that the designed antenna is a good candidate for wearable applications.

This paper presents a hexa-band frequency reconfigurable planar antenna, printed on a 1.6 mm thicker FR 4 substrate and backed by a truncated ground plane. The given antenna operates in four different frequency modes, depending on the state of the two lumped element switches. The proposed antenna works at six frequencies, 2.10, 2.40, 3.35, 3.50, 5.28, and 5.97 GHz. These frequency bands are dedicated to useful wireless applications, including 3G Advanced (2.10 GHz), Wireless Fidelity (Wi-Fi) (2.40 GHz), WiMAX (3.35 GHz), WiMAX (3.5 GHz), WLAN (5.28 GHz) and fixed-satellite and mobile satellite services (5.97 GHz). Satisfactory gain of 1.96, 2.20, 2.671, 2.81, 3.80, and 3.88 dBi, efficiency of 92.5, 94.5, 94.56, 95.0, 93.8, and 97.0% and bandwidth of 332, 485, 1020, 1080, 512, and 465 MHz has been obtained at 2.10, 2.40, 3.35, 3.50, 5.28, and 5.97 GHz, respectively. The modeling and simulations are conducted in CST MWS (2014). The simulated reflection coefficient and radiation pattern are validated in antenna measurement facility. In addition, the specific absorption rate of the antenna on a flat section of human body is also studied. The antenna is compact, low profile, and vastly suitable for multi-band wireless devices.

Land masking of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images is generally accomplished by applying either archived shoreline databases or image segmentation. However, those methods cannot be solely applied to geographical areas complicated with many small islands and exposed rocks. Therefore, we have proposed a new procedure where Sobel edge extraction is applied to detect the edges of all objects from KOMPSAT-5 X-band SAR images, followed by a merging process with the edges from the land objects based on Electronic Navigational Chart (ENC) coastlines. Using the land mask data, geometrically corrected SAR images were masked before applying a ship detection algorithm. This land masking procedure was applied to several images covering different areas of the Korean Peninsula. The results show that land targets such as newly constructed and natural objects were also masked, and thus did not create false alarms during ship detection. Therefore, this method can be used to assist precise ship detection using SAR images in coastal waters.

The duty to rescue persons in distress at sea is a fundamental rule of international law. It has been incorporated in international treaties and forms the content of a norm of customary international law. It applies both during peacetime and during wartime, albeit with the necessary adjustments to take into account the different circumstances. States are also under the duty to provide search and rescue services. This article discusses the content and limitations of these provisions and assesses their potential to ensure the protection of human lives at sea. Furthermore, the article suggests that reference to the right to life, as protected in international human rights law, may be useful in further safeguarding human life and ensuring compliance by States with their duties.

This paper presents the design, implementation, and validation tests of a C-band analog-front-end (AFE) for the frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) radar. The system was designed to be used in various radar applications, including short rage mode, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and moving target indication (MTI) mode. The AFE presented here was based on commercial off-the-shelf radio frequency components, and designed as a homodyne system, so the final applications were based on the FMCW radar. Validation tests and experiments were carried out in the laboratory and in open-air environments. The authors present tests of the AFE, including MTI and SAR trials, conducted using a ground moving platform (a car) and an airborne platform (a small aircraft). The results are discussed with the prospect of future work and further improvements in mind.

Changes of glaciers and snow cover in polar regions affect a wide range of physical and ecosystem processes on land and in the adjacent marine environment. In this study, we investigated the potential of 11-day repeat high-resolution satellite image time series from the TerraSAR-X mission to derive glaciological and hydrological parameters on King George Island, Antarctica, between 25 October 2010 and 19 April 2011. The spatial pattern and temporal evolution of snow cover extent on ice-free areas can be monitored using multi-temporal coherence images. Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) coherence is used to map glacier extent of land-terminating glaciers with an average accuracy of 25 m. Multi-temporal SAR colour composites identify the position of the late summer snow line at ~220 m a.s.l. Glacier surface velocities are obtained from intensity feature-tracking. Surface velocities near the calving front of Fourcade Glacier were up to 1.8±0.01 m d-1. Using an intercept theorem based on fundamental geometric principles together with differential GPS field measurements, the ice discharge of Fourcade Glacier was estimated at 20 700±5500 m3 d-1 (corresponding to ~19±5 kt d-1). The rapidly changing surface conditions on King George Island and the lack of high-resolution digital elevation models for the region remain restrictions for the applicability of SAR data and the precision of derived products. Supplemental data are available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.853954.

Wireless power transfer (WPT) technology using the resonant coupling phenomenon has been widely studied. However, possible relationships between WPT exposure and human health have not been experimentally evaluated. In this study, we developed a new in vitro exposure system to evaluate the biological effects of magnetic resonant coupling WPT. The WPT was carried out using a self-resonant helical coil, which was designed to transfer the power with 85.4% efficiency at a 12.5 MHz resonant frequency. The magnetic field at the positions of the cell culture dishes is approximately twice the reference level for occupational exposure as stated in the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) guidelines. The specific absorption rate (SAR) at the positions of the cell culture dishes match the respective reference levels stated in the ICNIRP guidelines. In this paper, the coil design for the magnetic resonant coupling in the in vitro exposure system and characteristics, such as power transfer efficiency, electric field and magnetic field distributions, and SAR of the exposure system, are described.