Multi-beam Antenna Technology Research Articles

Design and Development of Multibeam Antenna Technologies for 5G Wireless Communications

Multibeam antenna (MBA) systems operating in the millimeter-wave frequency bands have drawn significant attention from researchers and are being effectively studied due to the demanding system needs for the fifth-generation (5G) wireless communication systems and the drastic spectrum scarcity at the existing cellular frequency range. To enable a greater transmission speed, an enhanced signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio, an enhanced spectral and energy performance, and flexible beam shaping, they serve as the primary antenna technology. They offer tremendous potential for serving as the crucial infrastructure for facilitating beamforming and massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) which uplift the 5G. To achieve this, a novel beamforming design and optimization approach based on the Convex Time Modulated Particle Swarm Optimization (CTM-PSO) algorithm is suggested for 5G communication networks, offering multiple concurrent transceivers to support efficient beamformed interactions whereas a second beam concurrently detects the atmosphere around the base-station. The suggested beamforming method combines the optimization of the transmitter and receiver beamforming weights to increase sensor performance, reduce potential intervention resulting from the communication beams, and ensure the communications link's target beamforming gains. Comprehensive numerical assessments are used to evaluate the effectiveness of the recommended method, showing that it may provide significant improvements over more conventional beamforming methods.

Quasi-Optical Multi-Beam Antenna Technologies for B5G and 6G mmWave and THz Networks: A Review

Multi-beam antennas are critical components in future terrestrial and non-terrestrial wireless communications networks. The multiple beams produced by these antennas will enable dynamic interconnection of various terrestrial, airborne and space-borne network nodes. As the operating frequency increases to the high millimeter wave (mmWave) and terahertz (THz) bands for beyond 5G (B5G) and sixth-generation (6G) systems, quasi-optical techniques are expected to become dominant in the design of high gain multi-beam antennas. This paper presents a timely overview of the mainstream quasi-optical techniques employed in current and future multi-beam antennas. Their operating principles and design techniques along with those of various quasi-optical beamformers are presented. These include both conventional and advanced lens and reflector based configurations to realize high gain multiple beams at low cost and in small form factors. New research challenges and industry trends in the field, such as planar lenses based on transformation optics and metasurface-based transmitarrays, are discussed to foster further innovations in the microwave and antenna research community.

Multi-beam coverage and beamforming technology for high altitude platform station communication system

Multi-beam antenna technology can effectively mitigate the impact of deep fading caused by multipath propagation on communication quality through spatial diversity and increase the reliability of wireless mobile communication systems. At the same time, the multi-beam antenna with beamforming algorithm as the key technology can realize spatial division multiple access (SDMA) by automatically adapting the weight vector of the antenna array, enhance the expected value, and suppress the interference. A novel beamforming technology increases the inner circle beam width and reduces the outer ring beam width to minimize the difference between the internal and external cell link SNR. This study considers reducing the number of cells by reasonably allocating beams, which satisfies both the requirements of coverage link quality and the difficulty of forming antenna beams. This research subject applies the scheme and strategy of improving multi-beam antenna technology in the same system. Under the requirement of cell coverage and partitioning, the related technologies and strategies combining multi-beamforming technology and space-time block code technology can obtain high coding gain and diversity gain without sacrificing bandwidth and effectivelyx improve the wireless systematic capacity.

Design and analysis of multibeam communication satellite links operated at Ka Band Frequency in Indonesia

In this paper, we design the link budget of communication satellite. This communication satellite is designed for Ka-Band Frequency for broadband communication in Non-Geostationary Orbit (NGSO) with altitude of 1200 km. The ability of this communication satellite depends on the strength of the signal and the amount of thermal noise. Ka-Band has wider bandwidth and higher data capacity but the drawback of this frequency is it is susceptible to rain attenuation in which Indonesia is an equatorial area that has high rainfall rate, so that the design of communication satellite in Ka-Band needs more consideration to determine satellite system parameter to keep the signal strength great. Indonesia is a wide archipelago country and satellite link design requires beam that can cover all Indonesia with great signal strength and multibeam antenna technology is one of solutions to overcome it. In this research, design and analysis of communication satellite is done using multibeam antenna. The main challenge of the design is to generate the link budget’s result to meet determined parameter. Iterative calculation in design must be used to find an effective link margin and bit rate of this communication satellite. The main result of this research is multi beam satellite provide better performance than single beam satellite in Ka band frequency. The use of BPSK modulation in multi beam satellite shows better performance than other modulation types.

Multibeam Antenna Technologies for 5G Wireless Communications

With the demanding system requirements for the fifth-generation (5G) wireless communications and the severe spectrum shortage at conventional cellular frequencies, multibeam antenna systems operating in the millimeter-wave frequency bands have attracted a lot of research interest and have been actively investigated. They represent the key antenna technology for supporting a high data transmission rate, an improved signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio, an increased spectral and energy efficiency, and versatile beam shaping, thereby holding a great promise in serving as the critical infrastructure for enabling beamforming and massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) that boost the 5G. This paper provides an overview of the existing multibeam antenna technologies which include the passive multibeam antennas (MBAs) based on quasi-optical components and beamforming circuits, multibeam phased-array antennas enabled by various phase-shifting methods, and digital MBAs with different system architectures. Specifically, their principles of operation, design, and implementation, as well as a number of illustrative application examples are reviewed. Finally, the suitability of these MBAs for the future 5G massive MIMO wireless systems as well as the associated challenges is discussed.

Millimeter-Wave Miniaturized Substrate Integrated Multibeam Antenna

Substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) presents an excellent candidate in the development of millimeter-wave integrated printed multibeam antenna depending on its inherent advantages. But the SIW-based multibeam antenna usually occupies a large circuit size. To overcome this weakness, we propose a novel miniaturized SIW multibeam antenna at the center frequency 33.5 GHz. Such a structure can be considered as an asymmetric multimode beamforming network (BFN) directly integrated with a compact antipodal linearly tapered slot antenna (ALTSA) array without additional phase shifters or connection lines. It has smaller circuit size compared with the state-of-the-art SIW multibeam antenna technology. Four beams with different beam directions can be generated to cover the angle range of around 76° with 3 dB beam-widths at the center frequency.