Short-Range Wireless Transmission in the 300 GHz Band Using Low-Profile Wavelength-Scaled Dielectric Cuboid Antennas

A short-range terahertz (THz) wireless transmission in the 300 GHz band is demonstrated using low-profile wavelength-scaled dielectric transmitting and receiving cuboid antennas (DCAs). These dielectric cuboid antennas are made of polytetrafluoroethylene with dimensions of approximately 1.2 mm × 1.2 mm × 1.3 mm. The near-field pattern of a DCA at 300 GHz was measured using an electro-optic sensing technique, and its far-field pattern characterization was based on the near-field to far-field transformation. The measured antenna gain was 15.06 ± 0.06 dBi. By employing DCAs as transmitting and receiving antennas, a 17.5 Gbps data transmission rate at distances of approximately 200 and 50 mm with bit error rates of 3.31 × 10–3 and 7.51 × 10–7 respectively, is demonstrated. The proposed mesoscopic scale DCA is a promising antenna type in intra-device communications and Kiosk download applications for future mobile devices operating in the 300 GHz band.

Distance Protection for Coexistence of 5G Base Station and Satellite Earth Station

In this paper, we investigate the coexistence of the 5G communication network with a fixed-satellite service (FSS) in the 3.5 GHz and 26 GHz frequency bands. We analyze a distance protection scheme for the FSS Earth station (ES) and 5G base stations (BS). Furthermore, we define the exclusion and restriction zones to develop a transmit power control scheme based on the Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS). An interactive power control scheme is also devised for the restriction zone and extensively analyzed through simulations. The proposed scheme is examined for practical scenarios such as the rural macrocells (RMa), urban macrocells (UMa), and urban microcells (UMi) as defined by the 3GPP. The impact of the antenna type is also investigated, and BSs with omnidirectional, 4 × 4, 8 × 8, and 16 × 16 antenna arrays are examined, as defined by 3GPP, for the 5G networks. The results confirm that 5G systems can coexist with the FSS and provide quantitative insights into the selection of the system parameters, including interference margins, exclusion sizes, and reduction zones, for different scenarios and antenna types.

Design of Broadband Dual-Polarized Rectenna Array for WPT Applications

A broadband dual-polarized microstrip array antenna designed is proposed. To achieve wide 10 dB bandwidth for broadband operation, the technique of applying a ladder-shaped monopole antenna type with a rectangular slot insertion in the ground plane is implemented. The proposed design showed wide impedance bandwidth of the 1702-2755 MHz (47.2%). In addition, adding an open slot into the rectangular radiating element with an asymmetric ground plane was used and resulted in a slightly displacement of the radiation pattern. The 1 × 2 array type for two ladder-shaped patch array elements are arranged in symmetric feed network. By meticulously arrangement the two array antennas’ positions to achieved good ports isolation, with 10 dB bandwidth for the operating bands in free-space can be achieved. This antenna is used as a rectenna (rectifying antenna), which receives the RF energy of vertical and horizontal polarization wave in free space for 2.4 GHz wireless power transmission. The rectifier circuit setup using two zero biased rectifier and voltage doubler circuit. A matching network designed with small size chip components have a significant improvement in impedance matching and eliminate high order harmonics between the antenna and rectifying circuit. The proposed dual-polarized rectenna provided the RF-to-DC conversion efficiency as high as 78.8% when 14 dBm microwave power was received at 2.4 GHz with a 1 KΩ load.

Long-Range UHF RFID Tag for Automotive License Plate

In this paper, various locations of an Ultra High Frequency (UHF) Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tag on automotive license plates have been considered based on the radiation pattern of the tag antenna. A small, 130 × 50 mm, passive loop antenna type UHF RFID tag for an automotive license plate was simulated with an EM simulation CST program. It was designed to have a larger back-lobe radiation pattern since the front side of the tag faces the back side of the plate holder to protect the tag antenna from bugs and dust when the automobile runs. The tag was attached to the side of a license plate holder with a dimension of 520 × 110 mm, the typical size of the standard license plate. The reflection coefficient of the tag antenna is −21 dB at 920 MHz, and the gain of the tag antenna is 6.29 dBi at the back-lobe. The reading range of the tag antenna with the plate holder, which was measured in an open field, is about 10.3 m, and the reading range of the tag installed on the bumper from the front of the vehicle is 9.4 m. The tag antenna is small enough to apply to a real automobile, and it is applicable because it uses the back-lobe pattern, so it does not require an extra device for protection from damage.

Underground meter wave antenna based on a patch structure with a metamaterial substrate

The antenna devices of the stationary radio communication centers of the old park no longer fully meet modern requirements. This applies to the extensive structure of receiving radio centers with expensive and bulky antenna fields. Maintaining such facilities in working condition, reconstruction and modernization is a very expensive and time-consuming task. Thus, the search for new technical solutions in the development of technologically technologically small antennas (EMA), characterized by reduced overall dimensions and cost, the use of which will increase the reliability of the radio reception centers of decameter (DCMW), meter (MW) waves, due to the hidden underground placement of antennas, is an urgent scientific and technical task. A compact, technological design of the patch antenna type (PA) with a metamaterial substrate (MMS) is proposed as a buried antenna of the MV range. By choosing this type and parameters of the antenna device, the main goal was achieved: to provide a minimal size of the antenna device, the possibility of performing the assembly of the finished product in a full technological cycle in indoor conditions (factory conditions), at the same time, there was an understanding that this design is an electrically small antenna (ESA) for the MV range. Therefore, this antenna has a high Q-factor therefore, it will be narrow-band. The problem is solved by introducing an MMS patch antenna into the structure, implemented on 4 resonators, each of which is a "fungus" with a flat square-shaped cap, the center of which is shorted to the underlying surface of the antenna by a copper wire. The use of an MMS located between the strip and the underlying surface made it possible to reduce the size of the side of the strip to m, which makes it possible to reduce the overall dimensions of the antenna device, reduce the cost of its design and increase the strength of the structure. The effective refractive index of the metamaterial structure was about 3, which corresponds to the use of a substrate with a permittivity of 9. The numerical experiment of the patch antenna model with MMS confirmed the possibility of ensuring good alignment with a load of 50 ohms, allowed us to expect a gain of about 6 dB from the current antenna sample and a radiation pattern width of at least 90 degrees. The results of a full-scale experiment in the laboratory and field tests on the current model of the patch antenna made it possible to verify the adequacy of the developed model of the antenna device and its operability.

Characterization of Inter-System Biases in GPS + BDS Precise Point Positioning

With the combination of multi-GNSS data, the precise-point positioning (PPP) technique can improve its accuracy, availability and reliability: Inter-system bias (ISB) is the non-negligible parameter in multi-GNSS PPP. To further enhance the performance of multi-GNSS PPP, it is crucial to analyze the characterization of inter system biases (ISBs) and model them properly. In this contribution, we comprehensively investigate the characterization of ISBs between global positioning system (GPS) and BeiDou navigation satellite system (BDS) in different situations. (1) We estimate ISB by using different precise products from the Center for Orbit Determination (CODE), Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum (GFZ) and Wuhan University (WHU). The results indicate that the one-day estimates of ISB are stable when using CODE and WHU products, whereas the estimates based on GFZ products vary remarkably. As for the three-day time series of ISB, a sudden jump exists between two adjacent days, which is due to the change of satellite clock datum; (2) We investigate the ISB characterization affected by the ambient environments of the receivers. The result shows that the ISBs estimated from receivers (and antennas) with same type are still inconsistent, which indicates that the ambient environment, probably the temperature, influences the ISB characterization as well, since the receivers are in different areas; (3) We analyze the ISB characterization affected by receiver and antenna type with the same ambient environment. To ensure the same ambient environment, the ultra-short baselines were applied to investigate the ISB characterization affected by the receiver and antenna type. With the insights into ISB characterizations, we carry out combined GPS and BDS PPP with modeling the ISB as time constant, random walk process and white noise. The results suggest that the random walk process outperforms in most cases, since it strengthens the model to some extend and, at the same time, considers the variation of ISBs.

Dielectric sensitivity of different antennas types for microwave-based head imaging: numerical study and experimental verification

The design of proper antenna element (AE) for microwave-based head imaging or brain stroke detection is a crucial challenge in the development process of microwave imaging (MWI) systems. The main purpose of this paper was to design, fabricate, and experimentally verify the compact and dimensions-reduced H-slot antenna suitable for the new generation of multichannel MWI system for brain stroke detection. The slot antenna type was chosen based on the numerical study of three AEs available in the literature, i.e. bow tie, slot, and waveguide-based. The study was focused on the sensitivity of the antennae (change of magnitude and phase of S21) due to dielectric parameters change or type and diameter of inclusion in a head phantom representing a hemorrhagic (HEM) or ischemic (ISCH) stroke phantom, respectively. Further, the analysis of antenna radiation to lossy medium/air and its immunity against plane wave exposure was carried out. The H-slot antenna was fabricated and experimentally verified (measurements of reflection as well as transmission coefficients) using a liquid head phantom with inserted HEM stroke phantom (both prepared as a mixture of propylene glycol, water, and salt). The phantoms were filled inside the designed two-port test system. Numerical models were validated by comparing calculated and measured S-parameters. The sensitivity of the H-slot antenna to the presence of the HEM stroke phenomenon within the phantom of the head was also demonstrated. The main advantage of the proposed H-slot antenna is its small dimensions, easy, inexpensive, and repeatable fabrication as well as mechanical stability.

UHF Fractal Antennas: Solutions for Radio Links Using Matlab Simulations

The paper proposes the use of MATLAB simulations as a first step in identifying proper antennas to be used in specific ultra-high frequency (UHF) communication links. Giving that fractal antennas provide interesting features, we aimed at comparing a few of their significant parameters with those of a monopole antenna so as to ensure signal coverage between two real sites situated at 5.82 km distance in a mixture of urban and flat – open terrain conditions. We started from the requirements imposed to the return loss of the antenna and to the link margin, we established their desired thresholds and then computed solutions regarding which antenna type in the set provide the highest received power and on which frequency sub-bands can be successfully used. The studied fractal antenna set were from the series Koch, Koch loop and Sierpinski. The chosen radio link refers to a real situation on the map. Generally, different narrow bands were provided by each antenna regardless of its type, but still, comparing them with the monopole, better solutions could be identified.

Reconfigurable Millimeter-Wave Components Based on Liquid Crystal Technology for Smart Applications

This paper presents recent development of tunable microwave liquid crystal (LC) components in the lower millimeter wave (mmW) regime up to the W-band. With the utilization of increasing frequency, conventional metallic waveguide structures prove to be impractical for LC-based components. In particular, the integration of the electric bias network is extremely challenging. Therefore, dielectric waveguides are a promising alternative to conventional waveguides, since electrodes can be easily integrated in the open structure of dielectric waveguides. The numerous subcategories of dielectric waveguides offer a high degree of freedom in designing smart millimeter wave components such as tunable phase shifters, filters and steerable antennas. Recent research resulted in many different realizations, which are analyzed in this paper. The first demonstrators of phased array antennas with integrated LC-based phase shifters are reviewed and compared. In addition, beam steering with a single antenna type is shown. Furthermore, the possibility to realize tunable filters using LC-filled dielectric waveguides is demonstrated.