2010 XIth International Workshop on Symbolic and Numerical Methods, Modeling and Applications to Circuit Design (SM2ACD)

Network Sensor Miniature antenna

Mehdi ALI* , Abdennacer KACHOURI** and Mounir SAMET *
Laboratory LETI, *National School of Engineers of Sfax, Route Soukra Km 3.5 B.P W 1173, TUNISIA ** ISSIG Higher Institute Of Industrial Systems Gabes CP 6011 TUNISIA mahdialii@yahoo.fr, Abdennaceur.kachouri@enis.rnu.tn, Mounir.samet@enis.rnu.tn Abstract Nowadays, Sensor network is extensively practical in numerous fields including general engineering, agriculture and environmental monitoring, health monitoring and surgery [1]. Sensors are designed as increasingly efficient and Miniature. As a matter of fact, the most important factor in the design of RF communications is the size of the antenna [2]. In fact, Miniaturization will be subject to steady progress, except for two crucial components which are the antenna and the battery. Here, it is a real challenge to discover original solutions to go a step forward. This paper introduces the concept of a meandered rectangular patch antenna using gap matching impedance with planar feed. A reduction of about 60% compared with the conventional microstrip patch antenna has been eventually achieved. I. INTRODUCTION

II.

METHOD AND MATERIAL

A rectangular patch antenna conventionally resonating for 2.45GHz will be designed on FR4 sheep substrate. An experiment is going to be carried to confirm the efficiency of the matching impedance method and define the optimal dimension of the meandering slits so as to acquire a miniature antenna with the best possible characteristics. A. Finding out patch dimensions The dimensions of the patch are expressed by the following equations:
c 2f c L= 2f W= L 2 +1 L

(1) (2) (3) (4)

Generally speaking, conventional microstrip antennas have a conducting patch printed on a grounded microwave substrate, and have the distinctive features of low profile, light weight and easy fabrication [3]. Nevertheless, microstrip antennas obviously have a narrow bandwidth. Furthermore, applications in modern mobile communication systems usually require lesser size antenna in order to meet the miniaturization requirements of mobile units. Miniaturization typically involves a slight degradation of the patch characteristics, thats why bandwidth and gain enhancement is usually required for practical applications. Several processes are used; design using shorting-pin loading [4], design using chip-resistor loading [5], design using chip capacitor loading [6], meandered ground plane [7] and meandered patch antenna [8]. By meandering slits in the patch, the antenna is due to consist of connected different size resonators at a higher resonant frequency [9].In this case matching impedance to 50 becomes difficult using microstrip inset line feed with a quarter-wave length. Using a microstrip interdigital capacitor seems to be an efficient way to achieve accurate matched impedance [10] for the designed meandered antenna. In order to obtain the maximum reduction patch dimensions, we can operate as many slits as possible.

=L+2 L ( (

L = 0.412 h

W + 0.3) + 0.264 h W 0.258) + 0.813 h

f0 : Central resonance frequency taken 2.45 GHz . The previous equations (1), (2), (3) and (4) gave W=37.5 and L=32 an adjustment is operated when simulating antenna leads to L=27.1 mm and W= 35mm. B. Dimension reducting acting on the feeding device Basically, a matching juncture device is needed between the load and the feeding point in the patch antenna. This structure is shown in Fig.1.
Inset microstrip Feed line Patch antenna

Y X
Figure. 1 Basic patch antenna Ground plane

Quite a lot of publications have investigated many possible kinds of microstrip antenna feeding, among which are the
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2010 XIth International Workshop on Symbolic and Numerical Methods, Modeling and Applications to Circuit Design (SM2ACD)

microstrip coplanar feed [11], aperture-coupled microstrip feed [12], proximity-coupled feed [13] and gapcoupled feed [14]. A typical gap-coupled feed is shown in Fig. 2. It is worth noticing that a narrow gap width provides an efficient coupling of power.
Coupling Gap

An interdigital capacitor is able to feed the patch loaded at 50 RF supply. Interdigital parameters, which are W, S, the number as well as the length of the fingers, are calculated to provide an accurate impedance matching. W,S and the fingers number are defined by the fabrication limitation, the length l is calculated by using complicated empirical equation found in [15] ,the length is easily estimated using (5).

Coplanar feed Line

=(

(5)

Where n is the number or the pair of fingers. The structure is designed, then demonstrated on Fig 7
Figure. 2 Gap Coupled Patch

The gap-coupled feed introduces a capacitive loading between the patch and the microstrip feeding line, the capacitance is controlled by adjusting the line and the gap width. The gap is modelled by the lamped circuit shown on Fig. 3

Figure. 7 simulated return loss versus frequency and current distribution Planar patch antenna using an Interdigital capacitor

Figure. 3 Gap equivalent lamped circuit

The coplanar microstrip transmission line /4 long is modelled as shown on the Fig 4.

40% antenna size reduction is achieved if such antenna is used to replace a regular microstrip antenna fed with an inset microstrip transmission line at the same operating frequency. C. Inserting narrow slits at the patchs non radiating edges . For a rectangular radiating patch, the meandering can be achieved by inserting several narrow slits at the patchs non radiating edges Fig.8.

Figure. 4 Transmission line equivalent lamped circuit

The feeding line and the gap could be replaced by the equivalent circuit of an interdigital capacitor fig. 5. W l
Figure. 8 patch antenna on which a pair of slits is operated (W=28.7 mm ; L=29mm; r= 4.32 tan =0.0018)

s
Figure. 5 A four fingers interdigital capacitor

The interdigital capacitor could be modelled as follow:

1) Effect of the slits length When the length of the inserted slits increases, this leads to a decrease in the antennas fundamental resonant frequency and accordingly to a reduction in the antenna size at a fixed operating frequency. Table I summarises the experiment carried out.
TABLE. I EFFECT OF LENGTHENING THE SLITS (IC: INTERDIGITAL CAPACITOR)
Slits length(mm) fr (GHz) I C dimensions

Figure. 6 Interdigital capacitor equivalent lamped circuit

0 2x4 2x7 2x9 2x11

2.45 2.2 2 1.87 1.75

Np=2 L=2.6mm Np=3 L=2.85mm Np=3 L=3.1mm Np=3 L=3.3mm Np=3 L=3.5mm

2010 XIth International Workshop on Symbolic and Numerical Methods, Modeling and Applications to Circuit Design (SM2ACD)

The operating slits on the patch antenna make the antenna resonate at lower frequency .This technique is based on lengthening the excited patch surface current path [16] as shown on the Fig.9.
S11
0 -10 M [dB] ag. -20 -30 -40 1.4 1.6 1.8 2.0 2.2 2.4 2.6 2.8 Frequency
Figure. 11 Square patch with a different large pair of slits (W=28.7 mm ; L=35mm; r= 4.32 tan =0.0018 l= 2x7mm )

The findings are explained in the table as well as the figure hereafter.
TABLE. III FREQUENCY DEPEND ON THE WIDENESS OF THE SLITS
slits wildness (mm) fr (GHz)

l =2x7

l =0

l =2x9

l =2x4

0 0.4 1 3 5.5

2.45 2.1 2.05 1.95 1.9

l=2x11
0 -10 M ag. [dB] -20 -30 -40 1.6 1.8 2.0

S11

Figure. 9 Return loss versus frequency antenna on which a pair of slits is operated

2) Effect of the position of the slits In order to find the optimal position at which the slits produced the maximum of reduction effect, experiments have been carried out. The findings are exposed in table II. Antenna dimensions (W=28.7 mm ;L=35mm; r= 4.32 tan =0.0018, l= 2x7mm =0.5mm).
TABLE. II E FFECT OF THE POSITION OF THE SLITS
(d) Distance feed line slits position (mm) fr (GHz)

2.2 Frequency

2.4

2.6

2.8

L/2 5.5 23

2.0 2.28 2.28

=1
the

=0

=3

=0.4 =5.5

Figure. 12 return loss versus frequency for different wide slits

(d) is the distance between the load and the slit position, width of the slits, as demonstrated on Fig.10. l

The frequency decreases when the wideness of the slits increases, but the characteristic are altered. To determine the reduction percentage of the antenna using interdigital capacitor and operating slits compared to a conventional antenna fed with a 50 inset microstrip line. Table IV shows clearly the process followed.
TABLE. IV COMPARATIVE STUDY Study using advanced design system simulator feed
Perturbation Antenna Dim. XxY (mm 2) Reduction Gain/ band width (-10dB)

d
Figure. 10 slits operated in different positions Microstrip line

The upper limit reduction is achieved by embedding slits in the suitable position in the radiating patch, probably the middle of the radiating edges as illustrated in TABLE.II 3) Effect of the slits wideness: To check the effect of the slits wideness on the patch reduction, the experiment below has been done.

None conventionnal None Optimal design Slits(2 x 5mm) Slits(2 x 8mm) Slits(2x10mm)

35 x 54 35 x 31.7 29 x 31 27 x 30 25 x 29

Ref. 41.3% 52% 57% 60%

Interdigital capacitor

2.7dB 48MHz 3dB 52MHz 2dB 47MHz 1.56dB 41MHz 1dB 36MHz

X,Y: are the total dimensions of the antenna as defined on fig1.

2010 XIth International Workshop on Symbolic and Numerical Methods, Modeling and Applications to Circuit Design (SM2ACD)

III.

COMPARATIVE STUDY

[7] [8]

Many published works have presented several techniques to reach reduction in the antenna size. [17] Used expensive flexible substrate. [5] A chip resistor loading was operated however; ohmic loss of the chip resistor has resulted owing to this. [18] Used circular polarisation and inserted slits for a truncated rectangular antenna. All these methods decrease the antenna gain, band width or both. What has been brought over through this study is achieving up to 40% of size reduction without altering antenna parameters among which are particularly Gain and band width by feeding the antenna with an interdigital capacitor. This finding seems to be interesting as the reduction of the total size has been obtained without reducing the size of the patch antenna and thus an enhancement of the antenna characteristics is noted. For special cases where a small place is needed to lay the antenna, it is feasible to operate a pair of narrow slits in the middle of the radiating edge with the total length of the slits not exceeding the2/3 of the patch wideness , the gain and the band width are affected, reduction size may go up to 60%. This conclusion is made obvious with reference to table IV. Furthermore, we have proved that the interdigital capacitor is practical for matching impedance for perturbed antenna structures especially those having several meandering slits at Its edges. IV.
CONCLUSION

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[11] [12] [13]

[14]

[15] [16] [17]

[18]

KIN-LU WONG Compact and Broadband Microstrip Antennas, 2002 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York. J. S. Kuo and K. L. Wong, A compact microstrip antenna with meandering slots in the ground plane, Microwave Opt. Technol. Lett. 29, 9597, April 20, 2001. Y. X. Guo, K. M. Luk, and K. F. Lee, L-probe proximity-fed shortcircuited patch antenna, Electron. Lett. 35, 20692070, Nov. 25, 1999. A. Mahdi N. Kachouri M. SametNovel method for planar microstrip antenna matching impedance journal of elecommunications, volume 2, issue 2, may 2010 p131-138 R. Garg P. Bhartia I. Bahl A. Ittiboun Microstrip design Handbook Atech House 2001 D. M. Pozar, A Microstrip Antenna Aperture Coupled to a Microstrip Line, Electronics Letters, Vol. 21, pp.49-50, January 17, 1985. Kin-Fai Tong Jingjing Huang New Proximity Coupled Feeding Method for Reconfigurable Circularly Polarized Microstrip Ring Antennas, July 2008 Qing Song; Xue-Xia Zhang A study on wideband gap-coupled microstrip antenna arrays, IEEE Transactions Volume 43, Issue 3, March 1995 Page(s):313 317 N.Dib , J.Ababneh, A.Omar CAD modeling of Coplanar Wiveguide Interdigital Capacitor J.George, M.Deepukumar, P. Mohanan, and K.G.Nair, New compact microstrip antenna Lett. 32, 508-509? March 14 1996. H.Chiao T.Pei-Ju L.Ming-Kun Chen Yu-Jung Huang Shen-Li Fu Planar antennas on flexible substrate for wireless applicationsElectronic Materials and Packaging, 2007. EMAP 2007. International Conference on. W. S. Chen, C. K. Wu, and K. L. Wong, Novel compact circularly polarized square microstrip antenna, IEEE Trans. Antennas Propagat. 49, 340342, March 2001.

This study has enabled to demonstrate that is quite possible to take advantage from coplanar structure in order to conceive miniature antennas by combining both the technique of operating slits in the patch antenna and the use of an interdigital capacitor for feeding and matching the impedance. A 40% reduction in the patch surface has been eventually achieved, and this without any modifications in the antenna characteristics. Up to 60% and more could be achieved if needed by inserting Slits. Yet, we need to find out the most adequate method enhancing the band width and gain. REFERENCES
[1] [2] Mohammad Ilyas and Imad Mahgoub. Handbook of sensor networks 2005 by CRC Press LLC Krishnamachari, D. Estrin, and S. Wicker, Impact of data aggregation in wireless sensor networks,Int. Workshop Data Aggregation Wireless Sensor Networks, 575578, Vienna, Austria, July 2002. K. L. Wong,Design of Nonplanar Microstrip Antennas and Transmission Lines, Wiley, New York, 1999. W. H. Hsu and K. L. Wong, Broadband aperture-coupled shorted patch antenna, Microwave Opt. Technol. Lett. 28, 306307, March 5, 2001. K. L. Wong and Y. F. Lin, Small broadband rectangular microstrip antenna with chipresistor loading, Electron. Lett. 33, 15931594, Sept. 11, 1997. J. H. Lu, C. L. Tang, and K. L.Wong, Slot-coupled compact broadband circular microstrip antenna with chip-resistor and chipcapacitor loadings, Microwave Opt. Technol. Lett. 18,345349, Aug. 5, 1998.

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