Bow-tie retrodirective rectenna xy plane of Fig. 1) of 0, 35 and 70 .

It is observed that the array can

track the incoming signals very well.
Y.-J. Ren and K. Chang

A novel bow-tie retrodirective rectenna designed at 5.8 GHz is

proposed. The new retrodirective rectenna combines a traditional
rectenna with a retrodirective array. The new retrodirective rectenna
array can automatically steer its main beam towards the power source
and hence is not sensitive to the power incident angle changes. It can
provide a constant DC output voltage within
10 and 90% DC
output voltage within
30 . The conversion efficiency of the arrays is
84% when the power density is 10 mW=cm2.

Introduction: In the past, regarding rectenna development, the

rectenna has required a precise main-beam alignment between the
transmitter and the receiving rectennas to keep the power conversion
efficiency constant. This requirement has meant that the maximum
output voltage can only be obtained in the broadside direction and that
it will drop sharply when the main beam is not aligned correctly.
However, the transmitter and receiver components usually have a
narrow beamwidth at the broadside. There are two methods to solve
this problem. One is to use a non-uniform antenna array to replace the
traditional uniform antenna array used in the rectenna [1], which can
form an antenna pattern with a uniform magnitude. The other method
is to use the retrodirective array technique [2].
The retrodirective array includes the Van Atta array and the phase-
conjugated array [3]. The Van Atta array is simpler. It can be passive or
active, unlike the phase-conjugated array that always needs active
devices [4]. This gives more feasibility to combining its automatic
beam steering characteristic with other components such as the
rectenna. In this Letter, a new retrodirective rectenna is proposed,
which has many advantages compared with traditional rectennas.
Fig. 2 Measured bistatic patterns of bow-tie retrodirective array for
different incoming signal directions
An M=A COM Schottky diode MA4E1317 is used to convert RF
power to DC power. A bandpass filter is connected between the antenna
and the diode to block the second-harmonic signals generated from the
diode. Its insertion loss and return loss are, respectively, 0.13 and 20 dB
at 5.8 GHz and 19 and 0.1 dB at 11.6 GHz. This load resistance is
shunted with the rectifying diode.
Retrodirective rectenna measurement: Fig. 3 shows measured output
voltage and conversion efficiency against power density (Pd). The
external resistive load of the retrodirective rectenna is 150 O. When
the power density is 10 mW=cm2, the rectenna has an output of 2.83 V
and a conversion efficiency of 84.4%. The output voltage increases
with power density, as does conversion efficiency.

Fig. 1 Geometry of proposed retrodirective rectenna (dimensions in mm)

Retrodirective rectenna design: The geometry of the proposed retro-

directive rectenna is shown in Fig. 1. The retrodirective rectenna is
printed on Rogers Duroid 5880 substrate of 0.7874 mm (31 mil) and
is designed at 5.8 GHz. It consists of two pairs of coplanar stripline
(CPS)-fed bow-tie antennas, two bandpass filters, a rectifying diode,
and a resistive load. The rectenna has a symmetric structure owing to
the nature of the retrodirective array, which uses a transmission line
network to connect the antenna elements. The pair of antenna
elements is equally spaced from the array centre and hence has a
transmission line of equal length. The CPS bow-tie patch antenna is
chosen as the antenna element because it has higher gain than regular
patch antennas and the rectifying diode can be easily mounted across
the CPS. The bow-tie antenna has a 8.45 dBi gain at 5.8 GHz. Two
pairs of bow-tie antennas form the Van Atta array, where one pair can
serve as the receiver and the other pair serves as the transmitter to
steer the array main-beam towards to the power source and vice versa.
The bistatic pattern of the bow-tie retrodirective array is shown in
Fig. 2. The incoming signals come from the azimuth angles (on the
Fig. 3 Measured DC output voltages and conversion efficiencies at
broadside
a DC output voltages
b Conversion efficiencies
The output voltage ratio (VR) against the power incident angle (yin)
is shown in Fig. 4. The VR is defined as the ratio of the output DC
voltage at yin to that at yin 0 . The VR within
10 is larger than 0.98
and the VR is larger than 0.9 as yin < 30 . When yin > 30 , the VR starts
to drop because the gain of the retrodirective rectenna array decreases,
resulting in much lower received power that cannot drive the rectifying
diode well. The VR becomes smaller than 0.56 when yin > 60 .
Compared with traditional rectennas, the retrodirective rectenna array
can automatically align its main-beam towards to the power source and
achieves good rectenna performance.

ELECTRONICS LETTERS 16th February 2006 Vol. 42 No. 4


Fig. 4 Measured DC output voltage ratio against incident signal angle
with power density 5 mW=cm2
Conclusions: A new 5.8 GHz bow-tie retrodirective rectenna is
proposed. By combining the retrodirective array with the rectenna,
it has been shown that the new rectenna can automatically steer its
main-beam towards the power source and keep the output voltage less
sensitive to the main-beam alignment. The retrodirective rectenna
array can maintain constant output voltage without the need for
precise alignment.
Acknowledgments: This work was supported in part by the National
Science Foundation. The authors thank M.-Y. Li for etching the
circuits.
ELECTRONICS LETTERS 16th February 2006
# IEE 2006 15 November 2005
Electronics Letters online no: 20064008
doi: 10.1049/el:20064008
Y.-J. Ren and K. Chang (Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
77843-3128, USA)
E-mail: chang@ece.tamu.edu
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Vol. 42 No. 4