2008 Loughborough Antennas & Propagation Conference

17-18 March 2008, Loughborough, UK

DESIGN OF NOVEL ON-CHIP ANTENNAS WITH MULTI-BAND FOR WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS Dong H. Park Chung-Ju National Univ., Iryu-Myon Chung-Ju City, Chung-Buk Province, Korea (South) Email: dhpark@cjnu.ac.kr

ABSTRACT
This paper presents a novel on-chip antenna with quintuple band so that it will be able to operate in the ultra wideband (UWB). The antenna consists of two trapezoidal slots which are symmetrical in the patch with coaxial feeding. The two types of substrate we have investigated for antenna design are the HRS and Pyrex glass wafers. The possibility of on-chip antenna integration with circuitry is shown. As a result, a novel multi-band antenna structure for sensor network is proposed for a quintuple band application; C-band and X-band.

INTRODUCTION
Recently, the developments of sensor module in wireless sensor networks often require small antennas with onchip integration, low cost and more than one operating frequency. The antenna is the key element in order to fully integrate a wireless microsystem into a single chip [1], [2], [3]. Owing to its thin profile, light weight and easy conformity and fabrication, selection of the microstrip patch antenna can be suitable for these requirements. The design of on-chip antennas with the central frequency 6 GHz published [4]. In [4], the use of glass substrate enabled a small on-chip antenna and RF electronic circuits. This offered potentiality of low cost, low profile and simplified assembly. But these designs used for a single central frequency band only. This paper proposes the concept of tunable multi-band frequency so that it will be able to operate from the ultra wideband (UWB) [5]. Also, the selected wafer types are the Pyrex glass and HRS. And the designed on-chip antenna has a quintuples central frequency band by making two trapezoidal slots which are symmetrical in the patch with coaxial feeding. The slot-loaded antenna for UWB is categorized to reactive loading antenna and the frequency range can be varied in the range from 4 GHz to 12.5 GHz. The return loss values obtained by simulation are compared with the measured antenna parameters from [4]. The return loss characteristics for three different spaces L2 which make gap between two slots are depicts. Also, the resonant frequencies of on-chip antenna with upper, bottom, and dual symmetrical trapezoidal slots are solved, and a common resonant central frequency in all cases is 10.17 GHz.

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2008 Loughborough Antennas & Propagation Conference

17-18 March 2008, Loughborough, UK

As a result, a novel multi-band antenna structure for sensor network is proposed for a quintuple band application; C-band and X-band.

ANTENNA CONFIGURATIONS
In this paper, the two types of substrate are the Pyrex glass and the high resistivity silicon (HRS). For simulations we have considered HRS with a dielectric permittivity, r=11.9 and a conductivity =0.05 S/m. For Pyrex wafer it was considered r=4.6, and a loss tangent of tan=0.005. A schematic diagram of the microstrip patch antennas is indicated in Fig. 1.

Fig.1. The integrated patch antenna; (a) Cross-sectional view of the realized patch antenna with HRS substrate; (b) Top view of patch antenna with two trapezoidal slots which are symmetrical in the patch.

The dimensions of the coaxially fed patch antennas shows in the Fig.1 (b) and it operates at 6 GHz. The wafers thicknesses are 525 Pm for HRS and 500 Pm for glass. To decrease the substrate losses when HRS is used, a thickness 300 nm layer of thermal silicon dioxide is used. This layer has an r=4.0 and tan=0.05 and is assumed as an insulator. The metallization layers were realized using a 2Pm layer of aluminium. Finally, the size of the patch is 8.5 mm u 7.3 mm. As shown in Figure 1 (b), the slot widths W1 and W2 are 5.5 mm and 3 mm. Also the lengths of slots L1 and L2 are 2 mm and 1 mm respectively. The patch antenna is fed with a coaxial line connected to a point yo=-2.1 mm inside the patch where the input impedance is 50 :.

NUMERICAL RESULTS
All the simulation analysis is performed with an antenna model that is built using the designer tool. This simulation tool is intensively used in on-patch antenna design [4], where good match between modeling and experimental results is achieved. The two types of substrate we have investigated for antenna design are the HRS and Pyrex glass wafers. In Fig. 2, the data 1 and 2 shows return loss of the proposed on-chip antennas respectively. As a result, we can see that the simulated two data agrees well but it has some deviation value of 35

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2008 Loughborough Antennas & Propagation Conference

17-18 March 2008, Loughborough, UK

MHz and difference return loss -13 dB at 6 GHz.

0

-5 data1 data2 -10 Return Loss[dB]

-15

-20

-25

-30

-35 5.5

5.6

5.7

5.8

5.9 6 6.1 Frequencies[GHz]

6.2

6.3

6.4

6.5

Fig. 2. Simulated return loss for the antenna using HRS and Pyrex glass as substrate.

In this paper, the patch antenna is fed with a coaxial line connected to a point yo=-2.1 mm inside the patch where the input impedance is 50 :. The Fig. 3 depicts the return loss characteristics for three different spaces L2 which makes gap between two slots. Note that when the different space L2 is 1 mm, we can find a quintuple band for multi-mode resonance.
0 -5

-10 Return Loss[dB]

-15

-20

B=L2=1 mm

-25 C=L2=2 mm -30 A=L2=0 mm A B C 15

-35

5 Frequencies[GHz]

10

Fig. 3. Return loss characteristics with various L2; A=0 mm, B=1 mm, C=2 mm.

Also, fig. 4 shows the frequency operation can be generated by loading slots in the patch. In fig. 4, the character A represents in case of symmetrical trapezoidal slots. And the B and C indicates upper and lower slot respectively.
0 -5 C -10 A Return Loss[dB] -15 -20 -25 -30 -35 10.17GHz -40 0 5 Frequencies[GHz] 10 15 4.46GHz 5.08GHz B 4.47GHz 9.21GHz 12.44GHz 12.13GHz 11.23GHz 8.23GHz

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2008 Loughborough Antennas & Propagation Conference

17-18 March 2008, Loughborough, UK

Fig. 4. Return loss of the on-chip antennas with trapezoidal slots.

In case of A type with a symmetrical trapezoidal slots, the resonant frequencies are 4.46 GHz, 8.23 GHz, 10.17 GHz, 11.23 GHz, and 12.44 GHz. Also a common resonant central frequency in all cases is 10.17 GHz. As a result, a novel multi-band antenna structure for sensor network is proposed for a quintuple band application; Cband and X-band.

CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, the coaxially fed on-chip antenna with two different materials which were tested for antenna substrate has been proposed. It is shown that the possibility of on-chip antenna integration with circuitry. For extending of this concept, a novel multi-band antenna structure with slots is proposed for UWB antenna. It is also observed that the triple or quadruple band of the proposed antenna is increased to quintuple band by the two trapezoidal slots. As a result, a novel multi-band antenna structure for sensor network is proposed for a quintuple band application; C-band and X-band. Therefore, further investigations in this paper are necessary in order to improve the band width, the numbers of multi-band and antennas efficiency for applications of sensor network.

REFERENCES
[1] Jun Zhao; S Raman, "An Integrated Chip-Scale Active Antenna for 5-6 GHz Wireless Microsystems," RAWCON 2002, pp. 149-152, 2002. [2] E. Y. Tsai, A. Mbacon, M. Tentzeris, J. Papapolymerou, "Design and Development of Novel Micromachined Patch Antenna for wireless applications," Proc. Of 2002 APMC, pp. 821-824, Nov. 2002, Kyoto, JAPAN [3] Carmo, J. P.; Mendes, P. M.; Afonso, J.; Couto, C.; Correia, J. H., "A 2.4-GHz wireless sensor network for smart electronic shirts integration," Industrial Electronics, 2007. ISIE 2007. IEEE International Symposium on , vol., no., pp.1356-1359, 4-7 June 2007 [4] P. M. Mendes, M. Bartek, J. N. Burghartz, J. H. Correia, "Design and Analysis of a 6 GHz Chip Antenna on Glass Substrates for Integration with RF/Wireless Microsystems," IEEE AP-S Int. Symp., vol. 2, pp. 667-670, 2003. [5] M. A. Matin, B. S. Sharif, C. C. Tsimenidis, "Probe Fed Stacked Patch Antenna for Wideband Applications," IEEE Trans. Antennas Propag., vol. 55, no. 8, pp. 2385-2388, Aug. 2007.

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