Performance Improvement of Dense Dielectric Patch Antenna using Partially Reflective Surfaces

Recently, millimeter-wave (MMW) band is being considered as the spectrum for future wireless communication systems. Several advantages are achieved by utilizing the millimeter-wave range, including high gain with large available bandwidth, compact size, and high security. Nevertheless, attenuation loss may restrict wireless communication systems’ transmission range. Meanwhile, printed antenna technology has gained the attention of antenna designers’ due to its low profile and ease of fabrication. High-gain antennas are very desirable as a critical part of MMW systems. Designing millimeter wave antennas with high gain characteristics would be a significant advantage due to their high sensitivity to atmospheric absorption losses. Moreover, planar configurations are required in many applications, such as for wireless communication. The main goal of this thesis is to design and propose state of the art designs of Fabry Perot Cavity antenna (FPCA) designs with several types of superstrates to achieve high gain, wide bandwidth, and high efficiency to satisfy the requirements of today’s advanced wireless communication systems. A dense dielectric patch (DD) antenna is used as the main radiator and designed to operate at 28 GHz. The thesis presents several contributions related to the design and analysis of FPC antennas using several types of superstrates. The first research theme of this thesis has two parts. The first part presents a holey dielectric superstrate applied over a 2×2 dense dielectric square patch antenna array to enhance the gain, improve the bandwidth and efficiency, as well as to reduce the side lobe levels (SLLs). A dense dielectric patch replaces the metallic patch and is used as a radiated element. The measured results show a high gain of 16 dBi, with radiation efficiency of about 93 %, wide bandwidth of 15.3 %, and a reduced SLL. The second part focusses on a partially reflective surface (PRS) unit cell composed of two thin perforated dielectric slabs. The effect of the thicknesses of the unit cell dielectric slabs is discussed in detail. An array of the proposed PRS unit cell is applied over a dense dielectric square patch antenna array to broaden the bandwidth and to enhance the gain as well. The measured results exhibit a 3 dB gain bandwidth of 27 % with a high gain of 16.8 dBi. The second research theme presents an effective method to design a tapered superstrate of an FPC antenna with a DD patch element. This type of superstrate is designed to correct the phase above the superstrate to be almost uniform. The proposed single-layer perforated tapered superstrate is constructed by tapering the relative permittivity to be high in the center of the superstrate slab and then decrease gradually as it moves towards the edges. This tapered relative permittivity is then applied over a single DD patch antenna. The proposed antenna exhibits good performance in terms of the antenna gain and bandwidth. The antenna gain becomes flat and as high as 17.6 dBi. The antenna bandwidth is about 16 %, and the side lobe level of the antenna is very promising. A third theme presents the implementation and design of a high gain dense dielectric patch antenna integrated with a frequency-selective surface (FSS) superstrate. A 7×7-unit cell is used to build the superstrate layer, and applied above the high DD patch antenna. A modified unit cell is proposed to generate a positive reflection phase with high reflection magnitude within the frequency design in order to broaden the antenna bandwidth. A bandwidth of 15.3 % with a high gain of 16 dBi is obtained. Finally, a high gain linearly polarized (LP) substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) cavity antenna based on a high-order mode is implemented, fabricated, and tested. A TE440 mode is excited at 28 GHz. In this design, 4×4 slots are cut into the top metal of the cavity, where each slot is placed above each standing wave peak. These slot cuts contributed to a high gain of 16.4 dBi and radiation efficiency of about 96 %. The LP SIW cavity antenna was then integrated with a linear-to-circular polarization converter developed as a high gain circularly polarized (CP) SIW cavity antenna with high gain and high radiation efficiency of 16 dBi and 96 %, respectively.