Abstract
A compact reconfigurable and notched ultra-wideband (UWB) tapered slot antenna (TSA) is presented. The antenna reconfiguration operation principle relies on 2 mechanisms: in the first mechanism a resonator parasitic microstrip line electrically coupled to the TSA is used to notch the TSA at a specific frequency and the second mechanism relies on changing the input impedance matching of the antenna by means of changing the length of a stub line extended from an additional tiny partial ground on the back side of the antenna. The reflection coefficient, radiation patterns, and gain simulations and measurements for the proposed antenna are presented to verify the design concepts featuring a very satisfactory performance. Total efficiency simulations and measurements are also presented to highlight the filtering performance of the reconfigured antenna. When the antenna was reconfigured from the UWB to work into multiple frequency bands, the radiation patterns were still the same and the total peak gain has slightly improved compared to the UWB case. In addition, when the antenna operated in the notched mode, the gain has significantly dropped at the notch frequency. The simplicity and flexibility of the proposed multimode antenna make it a good candidate for future cognitive radio front ends.
Highlights
Reconfigurable UWB antennas can be deployed in cognitive radio (CR) front ends by reconfiguring UWB antenna to work into multiple predefined frequency bands
When the antenna is in the UWB mode, it can be used for sensing the spectrum and when it is operating in the reconfigured modes, the antenna can be used for communication purpose [1,2,3,4]
It is worth mentioning here that this notched UWB mode can be good for sensing, and it can be helpful in communication between cognitive secondary users who can still communicate more efficiently using the notched UWB channel without affecting or being affected by a specific legacy primary user who is currently operating at the notched frequency band
Summary
Reconfigurable UWB antennas can be deployed in cognitive radio (CR) front ends by reconfiguring UWB antenna to work into multiple predefined frequency bands. Several designs of UWB antenna with band rejection characteristics have targeted the cognitive radio applications [5, 6]. In the proposed antenna design, reconfigurability is introduced by employing stubs and changing the electrical length of the stubs by using multiple switches. These stubs are connected to an additional tiny partial ground printed on the back side of the tapered slot antenna (TSA).
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