An SIC-Fed Low-Profile Wideband Metamaterial-Based Antenna Array for 5G Wireless Cellular Networks

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a metamaterial (MTM)-based low-profile wideband antenna and its array using a substrate integrated cavity (SIC) feed structure for 5G wireless cellular networks. The proposed wideband antenna consists of two sets of square mushroom-like arrays; a semi-ground plane and a microstrip line-fed bow-tie radiator. Due to the unique in-phase reflection characteristic of the mushroom-like metamaterial, the bow-tie antenna wideband performance is maintained while the distance between the bow-tie radiator and the metamaterial-based semi-ground is considerably reduced to 0.014λ0 (λ0 is the operating wavelength at 5 GHz in free space), thereby satisfying the compact size requirement desirable in many wireless communication systems. The in-phase reflection of the mushroom unit cell is applied to analyze and explain the wideband performance of the presented antenna. The proposed dielectric-filled (εr=3.55) MTM-based wideband antenna element has an overall size of 1.0λ0 × 0.8λ0 × 0.054λ0 and attains a measured (|S11|<−10 dB) bandwidth of 31.3%. Subsequently, an SIC feed structure is employed to form an array antenna, and a measured (|S11|<−10 dB) bandwidth of about 17% is obtained. Across the operating bandwidth, which partly covers the 5G wireless communication in the sub-6 GHz band and 5-GHz WLAN, the antenna array achieved an average gain of 6.6 dBi and a radiation efficiency greater than 73%.