A Differentially Driven Dual-Polarized High-Gain Stacked Patch Antenna

Abstract

A differentially driven dual-polarized high-gain stacked patch antenna is presented in this letter. Two-layer stacked patches are adopted to increase the impedance bandwidth of the antenna. Each of the two stacked patches is inserted with four shorting posts for enhancing the antenna gain. To validate the proposed design, a prototype was meticulously fabricated and tested. The simulated and measured results of the antenna show fractional impedance bandwidths of greater than 19% for differential reflection coefficients less than −10 dB and a high isolation level between the two polarizations ( $ \vert S_{dd21}\vert $ larger than 35 dB). The antenna gain of up to 11 dBi was also measured for the two ports. Furthermore, a good agreement of radiation patterns between simulation and measurement with the cross-polarization levels lower than −16 dB over the whole operating frequency band is achieved.