Abstract
This article proposes a low-cost, high-gain, and vertically polarized deployable antenna utilizing kirigami pop-up geometry. It primarily utilizes a foldable polyethylene terephthalate sheet to produce kirigami geometry in association with a rectangular radiating monopole, two reflectors, and a parasitic strip director. The reflectors and director increase the antenna gain and provide a frequency-independent tilted radiated beam with a higher beamwidth in the azimuth plane. In addition, electromechanically excited shape memory alloy (SMA) actuators enable folding and unfolding, make the antenna easily transportable and swiftly deployable. We describe the step-by-step fabrication of the kirigami geometry and shape memory spring actuator characterization. The designed, fabricated, and tested antenna achieves a −10 dB reflection bandwidth of 48.8% (1.7–2.8 GHz) providing a peak gain of more than 10 dBi at 2.45 GHz. The tilted radiated beam has a significantly wider beamwidth (90°) in the azimuth plane, compared to 40° in the elevation plane. The measured results agree well with simulations, verifying the proposed design concept. The fabricated prototype offers cost-effectiveness, more rapid fabrication, unprecedented performance, and significant potential for use in a range of microwave applications.
Highlights
The rapid growth in military communication systems has led to the demand for new standards of deployable antennas with high gain, a tilted beam, and a wide beamwidth
Lightweight, high-gain, and deployable antennas that operate in the microwave frequency range are suited for military communication because conventional satellite antennas are quite bulky, requiring vehicular or helicopter transport [1]
A number of directive high-gain antennas with tilted beams based on different technologies have been reported [5,8,9,10], but lightweight, high-gain origami/kirigami antennas represent a attractive option because these folded antennas can be carried by military personnel and subsequently unfolded and deployed in the desired location [1]
Summary
The rapid growth in military communication systems has led to the demand for new standards of deployable antennas with high gain, a tilted beam, and a wide beamwidth. Origami concepts have recently been employed in various interesting applications, including mechanical metamaterials[11], flexible electronics [12], soft folding robots [13], pneumatic actuators [14] and several others [15,16,17] It offers a number of advantages, such as a lightweight design, easier deployment, and easier and faster fabrication. Kirigami opens new avenues for antenna design due to its various advantages, including its cost-effectiveness, lightweight nature, flexibility, convenient transportation, and rapid deployment It has lower fabrication costs and a more rapid manufacturing process but can be exploited for antenna geometries that are prohibitively difficult to achieve using conventional approaches [15,16,17].
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