Directivity Improved Antenna with a Planar Dielectric Lens for Reducing the Physical Size of the On-Vehicle Communication System

• Published in: Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 24; no. 21; p. 6831
• Main Authors: Seo, Seongbu, Kim, Woogon, Park, Hongsik, Seo, Yejune, Park, Dohyun, Kim, Hyoungjong, Lee, Kwonhee, Lee, Hosub, Kahng, Sungtek
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Basel MDPI AG 24.10.2024; MDPI
• Subjects: Antennas; Antennas (Electronics); array antenna; Communications systems; Drone aircraft; Ground stations; metamaterial surface; Polyphenylene sulphide; Radiation; radio sensor; satellite; Satellites; signal strength; transmission and reflection
• ISSN: 1424-8220; 1424-8220
• DOI: 10.3390/s24216831

As the physical size of a communication system for satellites or unmanned aerial vehicles demands to be reduced, a compact antenna with high directivity is proposed as a core element essential to the wireless device. Instead of using a horn or an array antenna, a unit planar antenna is combined with a surface-modulated lens to convert a low antenna gain to a high antenna gain. The lens is not a metal-patterned PCB but is dielectric, which is neither curved nor very wide. This palm-sized lens comprises pixels with different heights from the backside of PolyPhenylene Sulfide (PPS) as the dielectric base. The antenna gain from the unit antenna of 4.5 cm × 4.5 cm is enhanced by 10 dB with the help of a compact dielectric lens of 7.5 cm × 7.5 cm at 24.5 GHz as the frequency of interest. The antenna design is verified by far-field measurement as well as near-field observation, including sensing a metal object behind a blocking wall by using an RF test bench. Moreover, antenna performance is understood by making a comparison with conventional designs of antennas in terms of directivity and physical sizes.