Multifunctional titanium co-doped ZnAl2O4V2O5 composite ceramic nanoparticles: Enabling enhanced performance for L, S, C, and X band communications

Abstract

This paper investigates the potential of zinc aluminate (ZnAl2O4)-based microwave dielectric ceramics for use as materials in the 4–10 GHz band for patch antennas. Microwave dielectric nanoceramics (MDNC) play a vital role in the telecommunications industry, and ZnAl2O4 stands out as a particularly intriguing and promising nonmetal for wireless microstrip antennas. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) assessments confirm the presence of both ZnAl2O4 and TiO2/V2O5, establishing a dual-phase system. Simultaneously, energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) is utilized to scrutinize the composite nanoparticles for functional groups, morphology, and elemental composition. The introduction of titanium dioxide/vanadium pentoxide results in a significant augmentation of both crystallite and grain sizes. The estimated size of the nanoparticles' crystallites is 19 nm, while the dielectric permittivity and dielectric loss range between 22.82 and 22, and 0.14 and 0.007, respectively. This paper presents the key parameters of the fabricated patch antenna, denoted as (1-x)ZnAl2O4x(0.6 wt%V2O5-0.4 wt%TiO2) (ZAVT). The antenna's performance is defined by a return loss (RL) of −44.69 dB, a bandwidth spanning 1.723 GHz, and a voltage standing wave ratio (VSWR) of 1.23, all observed consistently at an operational frequency of 8.73 GHz in both measured and simulated scenarios.