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 Smart Materials and Structures

Smart Mater. Struct. 26 (2017) 105011 (8pp) https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-665X/aa7c40

Design and fabrication of an E-shaped

wearable textile antenna on PVB-coated
hydrophobic polyester fabric
Satheesh Babu Roshni1, M P Jayakrishnan2, P Mohanan2 and
Kuzhichalil Peethambharan Surendran1
1
Materials Science and Technology Division, CSIR-National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and
Technology, Trivandrum 695019, India
2
Department of Electronics Engineering, Cochin University of Science & Technology, Kochi 682022 India

E-mail: kpsurendran@niist.res.in

Received 10 January 2017, revised 6 June 2017

Accepted for publication 28 June 2017
Published 1 September 2017

Abstract
In this paper, we investigated the simulation and fabrication of an E-shaped microstrip patch
antenna realized on multilayered polyester fabric suitable for WiMAX (Worldwide
Interoperability for Microwave Access) applications. The main challenges while designing a
textile antenna were to provide adequate thickness, surface uniformity and water wettability to
the textile substrate. Here, three layers of polyester fabric were stacked together in order to obtain
sufficient thickness, and were subsequently dip coated with polyvinyl butyral (PVB) solution.
The PVB-coated polyester fabric showed a hydrophobic nature with a contact angle of 91°. The
RMS roughness of the uncoated and PVB-coated polyester fabric was about 341 nm and 15 nm
respectively. The promising properties, such as their flexibility, light weight and cost
effectiveness, enable effortless integration of the proposed antenna into clothes like polyester
jackets. Simulated and measured results in terms of return loss as well as gain were showcased to
confirm the usefulness of the fabricated prototype. The fabricated antenna successfully operates
at 3.37 GHz with a return loss of 21 dB and a maximum measured gain of 3.6 dB.
Keywords: screen-printed textile antennas, dielectric, patch antenna, conductive ink

(Some figures may appear in colour only in the online journal)

Introduction garments can provide live monitoring of the wearer’s health,

New generation wearable electronic devices help us to
improve the quality of our lives through continuous mon-
itoring of the wearer by enabling wireless communication
between the wearer and a nearby base station. Wearable
antennas are usually made by directly integrating antennas
into textile products like shirts and jackets. These days, textile
antennas are attracting much attention, particularly in the
areas of healthcare, defense, space, rescue operations, etc [1].
For example, in a network-centric battle field, soldiers are in
need of more compact and efficient antennas to communicate
with different wireless systems. There, a textile antenna plays
a vital role as it can act as an integral part of the soldier’s
outfit [2]. Textile antennas with additionally equipped
location and environment, thereby enhancing the safety of the
individual [3]. Ideally, such antennas should be light weight,
robust, inexpensive, planar, flexible and easily integrable in
radio frequency circuits [4].
Selecting a suitable fabric material with the desired
radiation characteristics is one of the major challenges in the
fabrication of a good quality textile antenna. Innovative
approaches are necessary in order to develop conformal tex-
tile antennas for wireless communication without causing any
inconvenience to the wearer. Providing sufficient thickness
for a textile substrate through multi layering is beneficial since
it minimizes the substrate leakage current, lowers the Q-factor
and enhances the bandwidth. The dielectric properties of the
textile substrate play a major role in antenna performance.

0964-1726/17/105011+08$33.00 1 © 2017 IOP Publishing Ltd Printed in the UK

Smart Mater. Struct. 26 (2017) 105011
The stability of the geometrical dimension and superior
dewetting property are additional requirements for textile
antennas [5]. In principle, a thicker substrate (up to a tenth of
the EM wavelength) with a low dielectric constant (εr
between 1 and 2) is a good choice for an antenna substrate
[6]. Polyester fabric is seen to be ideal among the fabric
materials available on the market because of its low dielectric
loss and moisture regain value (<0.4%) [7–10]. To enhance
the radiation efficiency of the conductive part of the textile
antenna, a protective coating is usually provided which can
diminish the surface roughness and also provide hydro-
phobicity [11].
Research on wearable electromagnetic antennas realized
on textile materials started in the early 21st century, where the
first report was from Salonen et al [12]. To date, a variety of
fabrication techniques, such as weaving, embroidering,
laminating, printing, etc, have been widely employed for
developing textile antennas [13]. The super fine metal fila-
ments or metal-coated polymer yarns can be woven into
textile materials to develop antennas [13]. But these antennas
are unreliable since weaving may sometimes cause wrinkling
of the textile material. Machine embroidering is another
successful technique to fabricate electronic circuits on textile
substrates, but it offers high tension in the yarn which may
adversely affect the quality of the circuit [14, 15]. In yet
another method, the antenna patterns can be easily laminated
on to the textile substrate using suitable polymer adhesives
but the high dielectric loss factor caused by the adhesive may
also deteriorate the dielectric properties of the textile sub-
strate. Besides, delamination of the conductive film occurs
during bending which is not recommended for flexible
antennas. As a feasible practical solution, printing is sug-
gested as one of the most efficient and cost effective methods
of creating conductive patterns on different textile substrates
[14]. The screen printing technique, in particular, is highly
recommended since it can simplify the fabrication of textile
antennas. The screen printing process consists of printing a
viscous conductive ink or paste through a patterned stencil
followed by a curing process depending on the substrate and
the property of the ink used [4, 16].
WiMAX technologies, especially mobile WiMAX
(3.3 GHz), can significantly contribute to the field of E-health
(tele medicine applications), defense and environmental
monitoring as it provides QoS, broadband remote access and
intrinsic mobility support [17]. Our goal is to develop cost
effective water-resistant wearable E-shaped antennas at
3.3 GHz specifically for WiMAX applications [18, 19]. It
should be noted that a variety of coats and jackets are made
using finely woven polyester fabric. Developing a WiMAX
antenna integrated on a thick polyester fabric is a promising
concept, since the antenna is flexible, light weight and robust.
To realize the proposed textile antenna, the conductive pattern
was screen printed on a surface modified multilayered
polyester fabric. Polyester was selected as the antenna sub-
strate due to its excellent dielectric characteristics and low
moisture regain values. The theoretical simulation of the
proposed polyester antenna was conducted by Ansys high
frequency structure simulator (HFSS) software. The radiation
2
S B Roshni et al
performance of the screen printed textile antenna prototype,
such as the reflection coefficient and gain measurements, were
compared with the simulated ones.
Experimental
Substrate preparation
A commercial grade 100% pure polyester fabric was
employed in the present investigation whose structure was
characterized by wide angle XRD (XEUSS SAXS/WAXS
system) using a Genix Microsource from Xenocs operated at
50 kV and 0.6 mA. In order to provide adequate thickness to
the antenna substrate, three textile layers with two adhesive
sheets were alternately stacked together using an isostatic
lamination press (ILS-46, Haikutech, The Netherlands). The
adhesive films used here were polyacrylate-based sheets
(IndiaMART, Mumbai) which provided very good adhesion
between the polyester layers without significantly compro-
mising their flexibility. In order to provide surface uniformity
prior to the screen printing of the conductive layer, the mul-
tilayered textile material was dip coated (KSV NIMA Dip
Coaters) with 20 wt% polyvinyl butyral (PVB) (Butvar B-98,
Sigma–Aldrich) in ethanol solution. Here, the coating was
done at a withdrawal speed of 50 mm min−1 with five con-
secutive dip steps at a dwell time of 1 min each. These con-
ditions are optimally sufficient enough to yield a flexible
uniform PVB-coated textile substrate. The microstructure of
the textile material was studied using SEM (JEOL-JSM 5600
LV, Tokyo, Japan). The surface roughness of the coated and
uncoated polyester fabric was analyzed using an AFM
(Bruker Nano Inc., USA) operating in the tapping mode
regime. The wettability and contact angle of the modified
surface of the substrate was measured through the sessile drop
method using a Goniometer (OCA 20, Dataphysics,
Germany).
Antenna design and fabrication
The dielectric properties of polyester textile along with other
commercially available textile materials were characterized
using a split post dielectric resonator (SPDR, QWED, Poland)
operating at 5.155 GHz with the help of a vector network
analyzer (8753ET, Agilent Technologies, Santa Clara, CA) at
room temperature (23 °C) and an approximate relative
humidity of around 73%. The results are tabulated in table 1.
From the table, it is evident that the textile materials have very
low dielectric constants in the range εr∼1.4–2.1. It should
be noted that the polyester fabric has a better dielectric
property with low dielectric loss among different commer-
cially available textile materials such as linen, cotton and silk.
The dielectric property of the fabrics not only depends on the
type of material used, but is mainly influenced by the di-
electric behaviour of the fibres used in the fabric, yarn density
and also weaving pattern [20, 21]. Furthermore, the adhesive
polymer sheet used to glue the three polyester fabrics together
had only a marginal influence on the effective dielectric
Smart Mater. Struct. 26 (2017) 105011 S B Roshni et al

Table 1. The dielectric properties of different textile materials.

Dielectric properties at 5 GHz

Dielectric con- Dielectric
Materials stant (εr) loss (tanδ)
Linen (single layer) 2.1 1.1×10−1
Cotton (single layer) 1.9 9.2×10−2
Silk (single layer) 1.9 4.7×10−2
Polyester (single layer) 1.4 3.1×10−3
Polyester (3 textile layer 1.9 5.5×10−3
stacked)- uncoated
Polyester (3 textile layer 2.3 1.2×10−2
stacked)- coated

Figure 2. A schematic of the fabrication process of the proposed

textile antenna.

Figure 1. Layout of E-shaped microstrip patch antenna.

Table 2. E-shaped microstrip patch antenna specifications.

Design parameters Dimensions (mm)

Coated polyester Thickness (h) 1.092
substrate
Length (L) 50
Width (W) 50

Rectangular patch Length (L1) 27.3

Width (W1)
Slot length (L2)
Slot width (W2)
Feed length (Lf)
Feed width (Wf)
Ground Length (Lg)
Width (Wg)
constant of the stack. However, when the textile substrate was
dip coated with PVB solution, the dielectric constant was
increased with a considerable decrease in dielectric loss.
Nevertheless, the dielectric properties obtained are good
enough for a practical antenna substrate. The proposed
antenna for WiMAX application was simulated using Ansoft
HFSS. The proposed antenna was comprised of a conductive
E-shaped patch, a surface modified textile substrate and a
conductive ground. The E-shaped patch was fabricated on a
50 mm×50 mm polyester textile stack of thickness
∼1.092 mm. The layout of the antenna prototype is shown in
38
17
8 Figure 3. WAXD pattern of polyester fabric.
15.96
1.5
figure 1. The design parameters of the fabricated antenna are
50 tabulated in table 2. The conductive patch at the top and
50 bottom ground were screen printed using commercially
available Metalon® HPS-021LV silver screen ink with the aid
of a semi-automatic screen printer (EKRA, Asys, Germany).
The screen printed antenna was cured at a temperature of
100 °C for 10 min in a laboratory oven. Interestingly, the
polyester fabric did not suffer any significant damage and
degradation after curing. The microwave antenna was fed
using a 50 Ω SMA connector through a microstrip line. The
reflection coefficient of the fabricated antenna was analyzed
using a HP8510C vector network analyzer, and far-field
radiation characteristics were measured in an anechoic
chamber. The schematic shown in figure 2 summarizes the
major steps involved in the fabrication of the proposed textile
antenna.

3
Smart Mater. Struct. 26 (2017) 105011 S B Roshni et al

Figure 4. SEM images of the surface of (a) uncoated polyester fabric and (b) PVB-coated polyester fabric and cross section of (c) uncoated
polyester fabric and (d) PVB-coated polyester fabric.

Figure 5. 3D view of tapping mode AFM image of (a) uncoated and (b) coated polyester fabric.

Figure 6. (a) Contact angle value of corresponding coated textile substrate and (b) water droplets sitting over the coated textile substrate.

4
Smart Mater. Struct. 26 (2017) 105011 S B Roshni et al

Results and discussion

In order check the purity of the polyester, a wide-angle XRD

(WAXD) measurement was recorded and is shown in
figure 3. The recorded XRD patterns show the diffraction
peaks at 2θ angles 17, 22 and 25 degrees respectively which
are characteristic of polyester [22, 23].
The microstructure of the uncoated textile material is
depicted in figure 4(a). From the figure, it is evident that
surface roughness is likely to be higher due to the macro-
scopic nature of the wefts and warps in the uncoated fabric.
Prior to this, we have tried to screen print silver ink directly
onto the uncoated textile material that resulted in a highly
rough microstructure. Those samples showed poor con-
ductivity, which is clearly due to the discontinuity in the
conductive path caused by the uneven surface of the fabric.
Hence surface smoothening of the polymer became inevitable
Figure 7. Simulated and measured reflection characteristics of if we needed to print a conductive circuit on it. In order to
E-shaped antenna on polyester textile substrate. reduce the surface roughness, the fabric was dip coated with
PVB+20 wt% ethanol solution (see figure 4(b)). Evidently,
in dip coating, the viscosity of the coating solution and
thickness of the coating layer will eventually determine the
texture, surface roughness and dielectric properties of the
textile substrate. From the SEM images, it is clear that the
surface of the coated substrate material became smoother than
before. The presence of the polymer coating is expected to
enable the uniform spreading of ink during printing onto the
polyester fabric, thus helping to achieve a continuous con-
ductive path for efficient electromagnetic radiation [11, 24].
Indeed, the flexibility of the fabric is well maintained and the
woven structure is clearly visible in the coated textile sub-
strate. Figures 4(c) and (d) show the cross-section of the
textile material with and without coating respectively. From
the cross-sectional view, the three polyester textile layers and
two adhesive layers that bond them in between are clearly
distinguishable. The approximate thickness of the PVB
Figure 8. Measured reflection characteristics of E-shaped antenna coating is around 50 nm.
after different bending cycles.
The 3D topographic images of the coated polyester fabric
substrate in tapping mode are shown in figures 5(a) and (b).
Table 3. Variation of centre frequency and return loss after different
Here also the uncoated polyester fabric shows a higher sur-
bending cycles.
face roughness of about 341 nm. However the protective
No. of bends Frequency (GHz) Return loss (dB) coating on the fabric reduces the surface roughness. As
0 3.371 −21
expected, as a consequence of coating the PVB solution on
10 3.393 −20 the polyester fabric, the surface roughness is remarkably
20 3.395 −20 reduced. The average roughness (Ra) of the coated sample is
30 3.401 −19 observed to be around ∼15 nm.
40 3.384 −23 A water repellent nature is an essential criterion to be
50 3.385 −27 fulfilled by all textile material for its application in the field of
60 3.355 −28 wearable electronics. Textile antennas, when they are exposed
70 3.359 −25 to environmental conditions, may absorb water due to
80 3.361 −25 humidity in air, rain, snow and more importantly sweat from
90 3.356 −21 human skin. The higher dielectric constant and lossy nature of
100 3.325 −17
water (εr∼78) compared to that of fabric (εr<3), will
dramatically change the dielectric properties and dimensional
stability of the textile substrate, which may lead to drastic
degradation in the radiation characteristics of the fabricated
antenna [7, 25]. Besides, the dominance in the dielectric
constant of absorbed water on a dielectric substrate tends to

5
Smart Mater. Struct. 26 (2017) 105011
Figure 9. (a) Simulated 3-dimensional radiation pattern and (b) simulated and measured gain of E-shaped antenna on polyester textile
substrate.
Figure 10. Photographs of screen printed antenna on PVB-coated polyester fabric.
shift its resonant frequency to unnecessary low values [26]. A
contact angle measurement can provide vital information
regarding the degree of wettability when a solid and liquid
interact. In general, materials are classified into super
hydrophilic (θ<5°), hydrophilic (θ<90°), hydrophobic
(θ=90°–150°) and super hydrophobic (θ=150°–180°)
[27, 28]. We found that the uncoated fabric was hydrophilic
in nature where the water droplet was completely absorbed
making the contact angle apparently 0°. The polyester fabric
after dip coating with PVB solution exhibited a hydrophobic
nature with an observed contact angle of 91o, and is depicted
in figures 6(a) and (b).
A prototype of the WiMAX patch antenna was simulated
using Ansoft HFSS software, screen printed on the novel
substrate and then evaluated for the practicability of the
proposed design. The simulated and measured reflection
characteristics (S11) of the proposed E-shaped antenna are
depicted in figure 7. The return loss of the simulated antenna
is 19 dB at a frequency of 3.3 GHz whereas the fabricated
antenna successfully radiated at 3.37 GHz with a return loss
of 21 dB. A reasonably good agreement was observed
between the simulation and measurement results within the
6
S B Roshni et al
limits of experimental error. Marginal disagreements between
the simulated and measured results may be due to inaccura-
cies in the fabrication process and may also be due to dif-
ferences in the relative humidity conditions in the antenna
characterization and that of the material characterization
cabinet [11].
An evaluation of antenna performance after undergoing
different bending cycles is critical for a wearable antenna
since worn fabrics which act as substrates to antennas are
subject to a lot of flexing and bending. In order to understand
the post flexing performance of an antenna, the antenna was
bent systematically along the E-plane and its return loss and
frequency were measured for a cycle of ten flexes. A plot of
the return loss versus frequency for different bending cycles is
plotted in figure 8. The variation of the central frequency of
radiation and the return loss is also tabulated in table 3.
Evidently, even after several periodic bending cycles, the
antenna showed an excellent impedance match with a return
loss of always less than −17 dB. No significant shift in center
frequency was noted up to 100 bending cycles. Even though
there was a small detuning in the center frequency, it is within
the intended frequency band [29, 30]. However, it is advised
Smart Mater. Struct. 26 (2017) 105011
that the bending of an antenna along the E-plane should be
avoided as it may affect its directional characteristics.
The 3-dimensional radiation pattern of a simulated patch
antenna is shown in figure 9(a). An omnidirectional radiation
pattern with a maximum gain of 5.34 dB is achieved. A plot
of the simulated and measured gain as a function of frequency
for the proposed antenna is illustrated in figure 9(b). The
fabricated textile antenna gives a maximum measured gain of
3.6 dB at 3.37 GHz while the disparity between the measured
and simulated gain is not more than about −1.7 dB. Never-
theless, the gain obtained by the newly designed E-shaped
antenna on polyester fabric is well above the requirement for
practical wearable antenna applications. Photographs of the
proposed screen printed textile antenna clearly show that the
fabricated antenna has a high degree of flexibility (see
figure 10).
Conclusion
An E-shaped microstrip patch antenna was designed and
fabricated on polyester fabric for WiMAX applications. In
order to examine the phase purity of the commercial polye-
ster, WAXD analysis was conducted. The insufficient
hydrophobicity and inadequate thickness of a single layer
polyester fabric is too inferior for it to act as a substrate for
antenna applications. Hence three layers of polyester fabrics
were hot pressed with polyacrylate sheets in between them,
which acted as an efficient adhesive. The effect of water
absorption on the electromagnetic properties of the textile
antenna was reduced to a greater extent by providing a
coating of PVB using the dip coating technique. This surface
modification was found to result in significant improvement
in surface smoothness and hydrophobicity. A contact angle
measurement of the coated polyester fabric showed a hydro-
phobic nature with a contact angle of 91o. The proposed
E-shaped antenna was simulated using Ansys HFSS software.
In order to develop a stable operation of the textile antenna, a
radiative patch and ground plane was screen printed on either
side of the substrate using commercial silver ink. The fabri-
cated antenna successfully radiated at 3.37 GHz with a return
loss of −21 dB. The measured and simulated results match
well within the experimental error limits. The fabricated
textile antenna gives a maximum measured gain of 3.6 dB and
it is adequate for practical wearable electronic applications.
Since the fabricated antenna is thin, flexible and water resis-
tant, it can be easily integrated into new generation clothing
like jackets that can sense and communicate data in a non-
intrusive way.
Acknowledgments
The authors are grateful for the financial support from the
Department of Science and Technology, the Government of
India, New Delhi (Ref: SR/S2/CP-114/2012). The authors
thank Dr K Prabhakaran of the Indian Institute of Space
Science and Technology, Trivandrum for the contact angle
7
S B Roshni et al
measurements. The authors are also grateful to Dr P Prab-
hakar Rao and Mr M R Chandran for providing the SEM
facilities, Dr Yoosaf Karuvath and Mr Aswin for AFM and Dr
E Bhoje Gowd for the WAXS measurement facilities.
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