1014 IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL.

8, 2009

Broadband Circularly Polarized Slot Antenna Array

Fed by Asymmetric CPW for L-Band Applications
Shiqiang Fu, Shaojun Fang, Zhongbao Wang, and Xiaoming Li

Abstract—A novel broadband circularly polarized (CP) slot an-

tenna array fed by asymmetric coplanar waveguide (CPW) with
an inverted L-shaped strip for L-band applications is proposed.
Broadband CP is obtained by an array composed of elliptically
polarized elements using sequential rotation feed technique. Ex-
perimental results show that the VSWR 1 5 impedance band-
width and the 3-dB axial ratio bandwidth can be greatly raised to
be as high as 52% (1.15–1.95 GHz) and 49% (1.15–1.9 GHz), re-
spectively. The proposed antenna can provide a peak antenna gain
of about 8 dBi at 1.5 GHz, with gain variations less than 1.5 dB for
frequencies within the CP bandwidth. Good agreement is observed
between simulation and measurement.

Index Terms—Asymmetric coplanar waveguide (CPW)-fed,

broadband operation, circular polarization, slot antenna array.

I. INTRODUCTION

ECENTLY, there has been enormous growth of telecom-

R munications services in the L-band frequencies in areas
such as the radar tracking, mobile satellite, terrestrial cellular, Fig. 1. Basic geometry of the proposed antenna element.
and personal communications system [1]. The use of circularly
polarized (CP) antennas is rife in these areas since they can pro-
In this letter, a new design for generating CP radiation from
vide better mobility and weather penetration than the linearly
an array composed of elliptically polarized elements using se-
polarized antennas. Because the coplanar waveguide (CPW)-fed
quential rotation feed technique has been demonstrated. The de-
wide slot antennas have the advantages of wide bandwidth and
sign principles of this sequential rotation technique have been
easy integration with monolithic microwave integrated circuits,
summarized in [7], and its application to microstrip patch ar-
the designs of the CPW-fed wide slot antennas have received
rays has been illustrated in [8]. With this technique, an excel-
much attention. The CP radiation can be achieved by the intro-
lent circular polarization over a relatively wide frequency band-
ducing of some symmetric or asymmetric perturbations into a
width can be obtained. A technique for an array to generate cir-
slot antenna. By protruding a T-shaped strip [2], [3] from the
cular polarization with linearly polarized elements is presented
ground plane or embedding a cross-patch-loaded [4] in the slot,
in [9]. However, there is a very high cross-polarized field in the
the CP bandwidth of the wide slot antenna can reach up to 18%.
diagonal plane. In order to suppress the high cross-polarization
The axial-ratio bandwidth has been further improved by im-
level, an elliptically polarized antenna element fed by asym-
planting a pair of grounded strips [5], [6]. However, these de-
metric CPW with an inverted L-shaped signal strip is proposed
signs obviously have complicated antenna configurations that
in this letter. The geometry of the proposed antenna element is
lead to a high complexity level regarding antenna design and
simple. A 2 2 sequentially rotated planar antenna array has
fabrication.
been designed by using the proposed element. A prototype an-
tenna array has been fabricated and measured to verify the de-
sign.
Manuscript received July 20, 2009; revised August 21, 2009. First published
September 04, 2009; current version published September 22, 2009. This work
was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. II. ANTENNA DESIGN
60771032).
The authors are with the School of Information Science and Tech-
The configuration of the proposed slot antenna radiating ele-
nology, Dalian Maritime University, Dalian, Liaoning 116026, China ment fed by asymmetric CPW is shown in Fig. 1. The conductor
(e-mail: fushq_dlmu@foxmail.com; fangshj@dlmu.edu.cn; wzb2008@new- is printed on an inexpensive FR4 substrate of mm
mail.dlmu.edu.cn; adamy@newmail.dlmu.edu.cn). and relative permittivity with a side length of . The
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this letter are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org. square aperture with a side length of is located at the center of
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LAWP.2009.2031662 the ground conductor. A 50- CPW transmission line, having a
1536-1225/$26.00 © 2009 IEEE
FU et al.: BROADBAND CP SLOT ANTENNA ARRAY FED BY ASYMMETRIC CPW FOR L-BAND APPLICATIONS 1015

Fig. 2. Calculated input impedance for the antenna element.

metal strip of mm and a gap of mm, is used

to excite the proposed antenna from a corner of the structure.
The CPW is asymmetric in nature. An inverted L-shaped strip
with the same metal width is connected to the end of the CPW
feed-line. For achieving efficient excitation and good impedance
matching, the length of the L-shaped strip is optimized by elec-
tromagnetic simulation. From numerous simulations, suitable
dimensions are obtained. The final design parameters are as fol-
lows: mm, mm, mm, mm.
Fig. 2 shows the calculated input impedance of the slot antenna Fig. 3. The fabricated antenna array with feeding network. (a) MS line to asym-
element. It is seen from Fig. 2 that the simulated input resistance 2
metric-CPW transition by via holes; (b) 2 2 sequentially rotated slot antenna
varies around 50 , and the input reactance keeps small within array prototype.
a broad frequency range.
A 2 2 sequentially rotated planar array antenna has been
developed by using the proposed radiating element. Each ele-
ment is separated by a distance of 140 mm (about ) and is
excited through a corporate microstrip feeding network that per-
forms the impedance matching and phase controlling functions.
Compared to using typical T-junctions and bend discontinuities
network that generate unwanted radiation at the discontinuity
of the feed-lines and seriously deteriorate the desired amplitude
distribution, the circular-arc feed-lines are introduced to alle-
viate the discontinuity and reduce the loss within the feeding
network. In order to connect the feeding system to the elements,
a microstrip-line-to-asymmetric-CPW transition by via holes is
applied as shown in Fig. 3(a). The feeding network is fed with a
SMA panel connector attached at the back side of the board. The
total size of the finished array prototype is 220 mm 220 mm.
Fig. 3(b) shows a photograph of the completed array prototype.
Fig. 4. Simulated and measured return loss for the antenna.

III. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS

The experiment was performed in a microwave anechoic
chamber. The return loss was measured by an E5071C vector
network analyzer, and the far-field performances were obtained
using the SATIMO measurement system. Again, the design
was also analyzed using the Ansoft HFSS simulation package.
The comparison between the measurements and software
predictions are as follows.
The simulated and measured return losses are presented in
Fig. 4. It can be seen that a good measured input impedance
match characteristic of dB over the desired
1.15 1.95 GHz range is obtained. The measured bandwidth
(for ) is over more than 52% relative bandwidth.
The simulated data are found to reasonably agree with the
measured results.
The simulated and measured gains and axial ratios of the
array are shown in the solid lines and scatter points of Fig. 5.
The 3-dB axial ratio bandwidth is about 49%. It is found that the
array antenna has an average gain of 6 dBi over the CP operating
1016 IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL. 8, 2009

lower-half space; only the upper-half one is shown here. It is

found that the high cross-polarized field is suppressed in the di-
agonal plane at angles not very far from the broadside direc-
tion compared to [9]. For further enhancing the peak gain and
lowering the back radiation, a metal shield at a location
from the antenna can be used. With the shield, the backward ra-
diation is reduced to 25 dB down from the peak value, and the
antenna gain is enhanced by approximately 2 dB. Extra care has
to be taken while introducing this metal shield. It will have little
effect on the impedance or radiation properties with the location
at least from the antenna. It is also possible to reduce the
back lobe by introducing lossy absorber material in the region
below the antenna.

IV. CONCLUSION
Fig. 5. Simulated and measured gain and axial ratio of the proposed antenna A 2 2 sequentially rotated CP slot patch antenna array
versus frequency.
using a microstrip-line-to-asymmetric-CPW feeding network
has been presented. The proposed antenna has a simple
structure, low cost, and broadband operation for L-band appli-
cations. The experimental results show that the obtained axial
ratio bandwidth dB can reach as large as about 49%,
and impedance bandwidth can be greater than
52%. The antenna exhibits good radiation characteristics with
moderate gain in the entire operating band. Although the an-
tenna design rules are based on the inexpensive FR4 substrate,
it is expected that they can be more effective when the proposed
slot antenna is printed on other available microwave substrates.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors are grateful to the National Natural Science
Foundation of China for providing financial assistance. The
authors would also like to thank Eng. F. Ma of Beijing Laird
Technologies Co. Ltd. for his help with the measurements.

Fig. 6. Measured radiation patterns for the array at 1.5 GHz. (a) Principal plane
(' = 0 ); (b) diagonal plane (' = 45 ).
bandwidth. The antenna gain variations are within 1.5 dB across
the CP bandwidth, with a peak antenna gain of about 8 dBi. The
maximum gain occurs at 1.5 GHz, while a minimum axial ratio
level of 0.5 dB is obtained at 1.3 GHz. The discrepancy may be
due to the untrustworthy FR4 substrate.
The far-field radiation patterns of the array at 1.5 GHz in-
cluding the copolarization and cross-polarization in the prin-
cipal and diagonal plane are shown in Fig. 6. Note that the
configuration of the proposed design in Fig. 3(b) gives right-
hand circularly polarized (RHCP) radiation in the upper-half
space and left-hand circularly polarized (LHCP) radiation in the
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