Abstract
In order to increase the gain of an end-fire antenna array and improve its broadband characteristics, techniques using a dielectric lens and defected ground structure have been investigated in this paper. The element of the array was constructed using an antipodal tapered slot, and two pairs of U-slots were symmetrically cut on the edges of the two antipodal fins to obtain better performance regarding impedance and radiation in the wider band. While loading an ellipse dielectric lens onto each element, the direction and gain were enhanced at the higher frequency. Meanwhile, a defected ground structure was added on the ground plane to decline the mutual coupling of adjacent radiation arms. This design method was verified by a four-element array and a four-way Wilkinson power divider was used as a feed network. Finally, a fabricated sample was tested. Experimental results showed the designed array was available.
Highlights
With development of high-quality wireless communication techniques, antennas must provide higher gain, a more stable radiation pattern, and higher radiation efficiency
The gain of the antenna is significantly increased in the working frequency band, as shown in Figure 3, especially in the high frequency, 10–12 GHz, and the range is between 1.2–1.7 dBi, which proved the effectiveness of the dielectric lens (DL) in improving the antenna radiation performance
These results tell us the dielectric lens acts as a dielectric wave guide that directs the radiating wave to the aperture center, and strengthens the field coupling in two arms of the tapered slot antenna (TSA), resulting in electromagnetic waves propagating similar to plane-like waves
Summary
With development of high-quality wireless communication techniques, antennas must provide higher gain, a more stable radiation pattern, and higher radiation efficiency. The tapered slot antenna (TSA) has become a very necessary choice, which provides wide bandwidth, easy fabrication, a directional radiation pattern, and low-profile properties [2,3,4], but the size is still big. Some other “director” forms have been used, such as an exponential dielectric lens [13,14,15] a higher permittivity material than the antenna substrate [14], a semiellipse [16,17,18] or fractal [19,20,21], or even an antenna substrate extension Other techniques such as an additional lens can be used to improve the performance of endfire antennas. 12.1 dBi within the frequency range of 7–11.2 GHz, which makes it an excellent candidate for integration in X-band wireless communication devices
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