See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/261148904

Wideband circularly polarized slot antenna

Conference Paper · October 2012

DOI: 10.23919/EuMC.2012.6459248

CITATIONS READS

4 106

3 authors:

Nasimuddin Nasimuddin Zhi Ning Chen

Institute for Infocomm Research National University of Singapore
134 PUBLICATIONS   1,676 CITATIONS    541 PUBLICATIONS   9,136 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

Qing Xianming
Institute for Infocomm Research
252 PUBLICATIONS   4,482 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

High gain wideband circularly polarized antennas View project

Ka-band Phase Array Antenna View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Qing Xianming on 02 January 2015.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 Proceedings of the 9th European Radar Conference
Wideband Circularly Polarized Slot Antenna
Nasimuddin, Zhi Ning Chen*, and Xianming Qing
RF and Optical Department
Institute for Infocomm Research,
Singapore
*
Concurrently with Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National University of Singapore, Singapore
e-mail: nasimuddin@i2r.a-star.edu.sg
Abstract—A microstrip-fed symmetric-slot antenna is proposed
for wideband circularly polarized radiation. The antenna consists
of a microstrip feed line and a wide symmetrical slot along the
diagonal axis. The slot and feeding structure are fabricated on
the opposite plane of a low cost FR4 substrate. The wideband is
achieved by changing the symmetric-shaped slot lengths and a
strip-line length. The measured 3-dB axial ratio and 10-dB
return-loss bandwidths of the antenna are around 50% and more
than 100% respectively. The boresight gain and backside gain is
more than 3.0 dBic over the 3-dB axial ratio bandwidth.
Keywords- circularly polarized antenna; microstrip feed line; slot
antenna; wideband; UWB;
I. INTRODUCTION
Rapid development in the wireless communication system,
low profile and wideband antennas with good radiation
performance are in great demand, especially in space
applications such as satellite, aircraft, and radar. The slot
antennas are suitable for these application because their
attractive characteristics such as low profile, planar geometry,
wideband, and easy integration with planar circuits.
The circularly polarized antennas are commonly used in
radar and wireless communication systems because they allow
flexible orientation of the transmitter and the receiver. Most of
them cannot be used in ultra-wideband (UWB) applications
because of their narrow circularly polarized radiation (3-dB
axial ratio) and impedance bandwidths. Recently, have much
interest in developing high data rate systems known as UWB
communication systems because of the continuously
expanding range of wireless communication services and
sensor applications. The planar circularly polarized slot
antenna is attractive in the present wireless communications
because of it’s inherently wideband characteristic. The planar
slot antenna offers much wider 3-dB axial ratio (AR)
bandwidth when compared with the single-feed based
circularly polarized microstrip patch antennas.
Several types of the circularly polarized printed slot
antennas with different feeding structures have been presented
in the literature for improving the 3-dB AR bandwidth. The
various shaped wide slot antennas with circularly polarized
radiation have realized using: a T-shaped [1] slot antenna
(12% 3-dB AR bandwidth), a wide square-shaped [2] slot
antenna feed by a coplanar waveguide (CPW) (18% 3-dB AR
bandwidth), a wide-slot antenna with a T-shaped stub [3] and
978-2-87487-029-3 © 2012 EuMA 504
a microstrip T-junction (22.2% 3-dB AR bandwidth), a CPW-
fed cross-patch-loaded square-shaped slot [4] antenna with 3-
dB AR bandwidth of 12.4% and a CPW-fed circular-shaped
slot [5] antenna with 3-dB AR bandwidth of 36%. The
circularly polarized radiation bandwidth can be further
improved by an L-shaped microstrip-fed printed circular-
shaped slot antenna [6]. The 3-dB AR bandwidth of 44% is
achieved with 38% impedance bandwidth. The CPW-fed stair-
shaped slot antennas have presented for wideband circularly
polarized radiation in [7]. Recently, another wideband CPW-
feed circularly polarized slot antenna was proposed using
lightening feed-line and inverted-L grounded strips [8]. The
circularly polarized radiation bandwidth of the antenna is
48.8%. Authors have recently proposed symmetric–aperture
antenna [9] using a CPW feed for wideband circularly
polarized radiation.
In this paper, a wideband circularly polarized printed wide
slot antenna is presented using a microstrip feed. The antenna
consists of a wide symmetric-slot with a microstrip feed. By
optimizing the shaped of a wide symmetric-slot, wideband
circularly polarized radiation can be achieved. The proposed
antenna was designed, fabricated, and measured. The
measured performance of the antenna is compared with
simulated results obtained by the IE3D commercial software
[10].
II. CIRCULARLY POLARIZED SYMMETRIC-SLOT ANTENNA
GEOMETRY AND DESIGN
The proposed wideband circularly polarized symmetric-slot
antenna structure is shown in Fig. 1. The G x G is the ground
plane area of the antenna. The symmetric-slot consists of
combined two diamond-shaped sections [9] along the diagonal
axis as illustrated in Fig. 1. The microstrip feed-line is along
the orthogonal axis. Each diamond-shaped section is along the
45o from the microstrip feed-line axis. The proposed combined
two diamond-shaped sections symmetric-slot antenna has to
support two orthogonal resonance modes, with a 90o phase-
shift for circularly polarized radiation. The bottoms of the
diamond-shaped sections are at symmetrically located (P, P)
along the diagonal directions from the slot centre. The F is the
strip-line length from the center of the antenna and W is the
strip width. The overall volume of proposed antenna is 60.0
mm × 60.0 mm × 1.6 mm. The antenna is fabricated on a FR4
substrate with thickness of h = 1.6 mm and relative dielectric
31 Oct - 2 Nov 2012, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
permittivity of 4.2 with loss tangent of 0.02. By optimizing the
shaped of the slot and strip length, the circularly polarized
radiation can be achieved for wideband wireless
communications such as UWB. The proposed antenna is right
hand circularly polarized for z > 0 and left hand circularly
polarized for z < 0. If the symmetric slot placed along the
other diagonal axis of the ground plane of the antenna, the
opposite sense circularly polarized radiation can be obtained.

(a)

y
G Top view

s1
-p,p

S
F
s1 x
W W1

S
p,-p

Bottom view
Figure 2. Prototype antenna: top view and bottom view

(b)
0
Figure 1. Proposed wideband circularly polarized wide symmetric-slot
antenna: (a) cross-sectional view and (b) top view. Measured
5 Simualted
III. MEASURED RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
10
The proposed optimized wideband, circularly polarized,
Return loss, dB

microstrip line fed symmetric-slot antenna was fabricated to

validate the design by measurement. The optimized and 15
designed antenna dimensions are: p = 14.5 mm, W = 3.2 mm,
S = 25 mm, s1 = 9.5 mm, F = 13.0 mm, W1 = 7.0 mm, and G = 20
60.0 mm. The photo of the prototype antenna top and bottom
views are shown in Fig. 2. 25
The fabricated wideband circularly polarized symmetric-
slot antenna was measured for comparison with simulated
30
results. The measured and simulated return loss with 2 3 4 5 6
frequency of the antenna is compared in Fig. 3. The measured
and simulated 10-dB return loss bandwidths are more than Frequency, GHz
100% (2.0−5.0 GHz) and 98% (2.0−4.95 GHz) respectively. Figure 3. Measured and simulated return loss with frequency

505
 The circularly polarized performances of the antenna were
measured using a rotating transmitting linearly polarized horn
antenna. Fig. 4 shows the simulated and measured AR at the
boresight with frequency of the antenna. The measured 3-dB
AR bandwidth is around 50% (2.75−4.60 GHz) and simulated
bandwidth is around 40% (2.96−4.44 GHz). The measured
impedance and 3-dB AR bandwidths are also able to cover
lower UWB band. The measured and simulated gain with
frequency of the antenna at the boresight is shown in Fig. 5.
The measured maximum gain is 4.15 dBic at 4.3 GHz. The
broesight gain is more than 3.0 dBic over the 3-dB AR
bandwidth. The measured results on return loss, AR, and gain
agree well with simulated results obtained by IE3D.
The measured normalized radiation patterns at 4.0 GHz for
both principal planes (x-z and y-z) are plotted in Fig. 6
respectively. Figure also shows both +z (boresight) and –z
(backside) directions radiation patterns at 4.0 GHz. Slightly
measured radiation patterns are different in the –z direction as
compared to the +z direction due the supporting FR4 substrate.
Thin supporting substrate for antenna is useful to achieve
almost same axial ratio and gain in both –z and +z directions.

15

12
Measured
Simualted
Axial ratio, dB

0
2 3 4 5
Frequency, GHz

Figure 4. Measured and simulated axial ratio at the boresight (+z) with
frequency

Measured
6 Simualted

4
Gain, dBic

-2

-4
2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5 4.0 4.5 5.0
Frequency, GHz

Figure 5. Measured and simulated gain at the boresight (+z) with frequency
Figure 6. Measured normalized radiation patterns at 4.0 GHz for both
principal planes and in both directions (+z and –z)

506
 IV. CONCLUSION
A wideband circularly polarized symmetric-slot antenna
using a microstrip feed has been presented and studied. The
proposed antenna has 3-dB AR bandwidth of around 50%
with10-dB return loss bandwidth of larger than 100% and able
to cover lower UWB-band. The antenna has broadband
circularly polarized radiation with bi-directional radiations.
The right-hand circularly polarized radiation is in boresight
direction and left-hand circularly polarized radiation in back
direction. The antenna can be used for only boresight direction
radiation (unidirectional) using a cavity-backed. The proposed
antenna is easy to design, single-feed, and low-cost.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank Ms Farhanah for
fabricating the antenna prototype.
REFERENCES
[1] K. L. Wong, J. Y. Wu, and C. K. Wu, “A circular-polarized patch-
loaded square slot antenna”, Microwave and Optical Technology Letters,
vol. 23, pp. 363−365, 1999.
507
View publication stats
[2] J. Y. Sze, K. L. Wong, and C.C. Huang, “Coplanar waveguide-fed
square slot antenna for broadband circularly polarized radiation”, IEEE
Trans Antennas and Propagation, vol. 51, pp. 2141−2144, 2003.
[3] R. P. Xu, X. D. Huang, and C. H. Cheng, “Broadband circularly
polarized wide-slot antenna”, Microwave and Optical Technology
Letters, vol. 49, no. 5, pp. 1005−1007, 2007.
[4] C. C. Chou, K. H. Lin, and H. L. Su, “Broadband circularly polarized
cross-patch-loaded square slot antenna”, Electronics Letters, vol. 43, no.
9, pp. 485−486, 2007.
[5] I. C. Deng, J-B Chen, Q. K. Ke, J. R. Chang, W. F. Chang, and Y. T.
King, “A circular CPW-fed slot antenna for broadband circularly
polarized radiation”, Microwave and Optical Technology Letters, vol.
49, no. 11, pp. 2728−2732, 2007.
[6] L. Y. Tseng and T. Y. Han, “Microstrip-fed circular slot antenna for
circular polarization”, Microwave and Optical Technology Letters, vol.
50, no. 4, pp. 1056−1058, 2008.
[7] C-J. Wang and C-H. Chen, “CPW-fed stair-shaped slot antennas with
circular polarization,” IEEE Trans Antennas and Propagation, vol. 57,
no. 8, pp. 2483−2486, 2009.
[8] J-Y. Sze, C-I. G. Hsu, Z-W. Chen, and C-C. Chang, “Broadband CPW-
fed circularly polarized square slot antenna with lightening-shaped feed-
line and inverted-L grounded strips”, IEEE Trans Antennas and
Propagation, vol. 58, no. 3, pp. 973−977, 2010.
[9] Nasimuddin, Z. N. Chen, and X. Qing, “Symmetric-aperture antenna for
broadband circular polarization”, IEEE Trans. Antennas and
Propagation, vol. 59, no. 10, pp. 3932−3936, Oct. 2011.
[10] IE3D version 14.0, Zeland Software Inc., Fremont, CA, Oct. 2007.