InSb Based Microstrip Patch Antenna Temperature Sensor for Terahertz Applications

Abstract

Reconfigurable sensing antennas (RSA) play a significant role in modern internet-of-things (IOT) applications. The RSAs are capable of transmiting and receiving electromagnetic waves besides sensing different enviroment parameters. This paper introduces a reconfigurable sensing microstrip patch antenna desinged to sense high temperature variations in harsh environment. The indium antimonide (InSb) semiconductor material is a temperature sensitive material employed in RSA designs in the Terahertz (THz) frequency band. An investigation of the temperature dependency of the electrical properties of the InSb-material is introduced. The proposed sensing antenna introduces high sensitivity of 1.588 GHz shift in resonance frequency per unit change in temperature (Kelvin). The resonance frequency of the InSb sensor antenna is changed according to the surrounding environment temperature from 264 GHz to 502.2 GHz with a broadband tuning range of 90.2%. The InSb patch sensor have temperature sensing range of 150 K starting from 250 up-to 400 K. At 300 K the InSb sensor antenna proposes a peak gain of 6.4 dBi with impedance matching bandwidth of 9.57%. An equivalent circuit consists of five lumped elements is estimated for the InSb sensor antenna using particle swarm optimization (PSO) technique at different temperatures. At T = 250 K the maximum radiation efficiency is 2.5% and is increased up to 86.3% at T = 400 K.