Elastomeric Textile Substrates to Design a Compact, Low-Profile AMC-Based Antenna for Medical and IoT Applications

Abstract

A neoteric, compact, low-profile, wide-band elastomeric textile antenna for medical and IoT applications is presented. The design synthesis of flexible artificial magnetic conductor (AMC)-integrated antenna is done using stratum of textile and operates within 4.76–6.08 GHz covering the 5.8-GHz industrial, scientific, medical (ISM) and 5-GHz Wi-Fi band for IoT applications. The rectangular fed design operates in the high frequency band which is widened and optimized to operate in the lower 5-GHz band and the notch etched with the monopole’s edges, suppress the cross-polarization component. The suggested design features an impedance bandwidth of 24.4% with a high gain of 10.59 dBi and has a compact footprint of <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$1.44\lambda _{0}\times $ </tex-math></inline-formula> 0.46 <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\lambda _{0}\times $ </tex-math></inline-formula> 0.0512 <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\lambda _{0}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> . Simulation and experimental studies provide evidence that in the case of structural deformities, such as bending and crumpling and also for human body loading, the suggested AMC-integrated antenna is stable and shows superior efficiency relative to the traditional monopole antenna. Thus, to a large extent, the antenna is stable to maintain its radiation properties. Furthermore, numerical analysis demonstrates maximum amount of the specific absorption rate (SAR) is 0.0832 W/Kg according to IEEE standard safety guidelines. The advantage of the suggested AMC-integrated antenna design is that it is resilient to moisture conditions and the enhancement in impedance bandwidth is achieved by simple cut edges in the radiator and the ground plane leading to a simple staircase design. In addition, the simulation and measurement results are consistent, thus confirming it to be a promising contender for sensing and applications in body-centric wireless communications and Internet of Things.