Design of Dual polarized Conformal Loop Antenna for wearable

applications

Abstract:
The antenna consists of a radiating element that splits the rods and makes current flow
through the center by using a feeder at the transmitter out that takes from the receiver.
This paper, presents about dual polarized wide band conformal loop antenna. This
antenna used for medical applications as on body device to check the condition of various
body parts. It is a challenging task due to human body being in the near field of the
antenna and the interaction between two. The antenna should be designed to be more
sensitive for change in body conditions and to be less sensitive to near field effects of the
body links at 2.5GHz ISM band. FR4(lossy) and Jeans are used as substrate material with
dielectric constant 4.3 and 1.6 respectively. Using CST studio suite software, the designed
antenna is simulated. As a result of using FR4(flossy) substrate, directivity of port
1(3.866dBi ) and port 2(4.663dBi) and with Jeans substrate directivity of port 1
(3.331dBi ) and port 2(4.657dBi) are achieved. The other performance parameters like
return loss, directivity and VSWR of the antenna are considered for analysis.
Keywords: Micro strip patch antenna, ISM band, Loop antenna, Dual polarization, FR4,
Jeans
INTRODUCTION
Antenna plays vital role in communication for transmission and reception of
electromagnetic waves in free space. The design of an efficient antenna providing low return
loss and high directivity for recent wearable applications is a major challenge. Micro strip
antennas have several advantages compared to other bulky type of antennas. Some of the
main advantages of micro strip antennas are that it has low fabrication cost, its light weight,
low volume, and low profile configurations that it can be made conformal, it can be easily be
mounted on rockets, missiles and satellites without major modifications and arrays of these
antennas can simply be produced. A dual polarized antenna, however, can respond to both
horizontally and vertically polarized radio waves simultaneously. A single Polarized antenna
is one that responds only one orientation of polarization either horizontal or vertical. This is
the important when looking at antenna because they are sensitive to polarisation, and
generally only receive or transmit a signal with a particular polarization. It is reduced by a
factor of cosine of the angle between the polarisation of the RF antenna and the signal. A
loop antenna is a coil carrying radio frequency current. It may be in any shape such as
circular, rectangular, triangular, square or hexagonal according to the designer’s convenience
[1-3].
 Figure 1: Fundamental antenna structure
The micro strip patch antenna consisting of a radiating patch, dielectric substrate and
ground plane. Ground plane called as lower conductor and the radiating patch called as upper
conductor and the dielectric substrate is placed between the two conductors. In micro strip
patch antenna, the ground plane is a flat horizontal conducting surface and it used to reflect
the radio waves from the other antenna elements. The shape and size of the ground plane
plays vital role in determining antenna radiation characteristics including return loss, gain,
VSWR. The common aspect of designing micro strip patch antenna is to choose the suitable
dielectric substrate. For particular applications, the various types of dielectric substrates
available in market that provides considerable flexibility in the choice of a substrate. The
dielectric substrate characteristics including dielectric constant (permittivity), dielectric
medium are most considered to design a micro strip patch antenna. The electrical
characteristics of antenna are determined by substrate thickness and permittivity. The
radiating patch is used to improve the performance of antenna. The micro strip patch antenna
consists of various shapes and the common shapes of patches are rectangular, circular and
triangle. Many shapes of patch design are combined to improve the antenna performance
parameters [4-5].

LITERATURE SURVEY

Many researchers have designed the micro strip patch antenna with flexible materials. Wen
lei and et al. [6] developed a dual-polarized wideband conformal loop antenna for capsule
endoscopy systems. This design exhibits broad impedance bandwidths of 271 and 247 MHz
for each port, covering the entire medical device radio communications service band as well
as the 433.05-434.79 MHz industrial scientific band.

C.R. White and G.M. Rebeiz [7] developed the single and dual polarized tunable slot-ring
antennas. In this type of antenna, the single polarized antenna tunes from 0.95 to 1.8 GHz
with better than -13 dB return loss. And the dual polarized antenna tune from 0.93 to 1.6 GHz
with better -10 dB return loss and >20 dB port to port isolation over most of the tuning range.

Sabban A. and Taylor & Francis Group [8] developed a book Novel Wearable Antennas for
Communication and Medical Systems. This book discusses the challenges and technology to
develop compact, efficient, wearable antennas.

The above the studies on design of micro strip patch antenna with dual polarized conformal
loop antenna for wearable applications. Hence, we authors getting interested in designing an
antenna with flexible substrate material which can extend its use for wearable applications to
enhance the performance of the antenna at the desired resonant frequency.
ANTENNA DESIGN
The fundamental structure of patch antenna is presented in figure 1 which consists of ground,
substrate and radiating patch. The antenna dimensions are calculated as follows [9].
A. Width
The width of the patch is calculated by using equation [1]

𝐶
𝑊= --- [1]
(∈𝑟+1)
2𝑓0 √ 2

B. Length
The length of the patch is calculated by using equation [2]
𝐿 = 𝐿(𝑒𝑓𝑓) − 2∆𝐿 --- [2]
𝐶
Where, 𝐿(𝑒𝑓𝑓) = --- [3]
2𝑓0√∈(𝑟𝑒𝑓𝑓)
And
−1⁄
∈𝑟+1 ∈𝑟−1 12ℎ 2
∈ 𝑟(𝑒𝑓𝑓) = + (1 + ) --- [4]
2 4 𝑊

Where, h is the height and W is the width of the patch. The patch antenna dimensions L and
W are obtained for the resonating frequency of 2.5GHz. The height h of the patch and the
ground is kept as 0.035mm.
C. Substrate
For flexible antenna, the substrate material may be Cotton, Jeans, Felt, Teflon etc. In this
work, the materials FR4 (lossy) and jeans with dielectric constant r=4.3 and 1.6 respectively
are used as substrate [10]. The thickness of both substrate materials are 1.6mm with the
dimension of 30(L) x 40 (W) mm2.
Figure 2 and 3 show the top and bottom view of antenna.

Figure 2: Top view of proposed antenna

 Figure 3: Bottom view of proposed antenna
Table 1 below shows the dimensions of proposed antenna.
TABLE 1: DIMENSIONS OF ANTENNA
Parameters Values in mm
Patch length 30
Patch width 40
Patch height 0.035
Ground length 30
Ground width 40
Ground height 0.035
Substrate length 30
Substrate width 40
Substrate height 1.6
Table 2 and 3 below shows the dimensions of cut away planes introduced in patch and
ground planes.
TABLE 2: DIMENSIONS OF CUT AWAY PLANES IN GROUND
Ground(mm)
Parameters
Length Width
Left Top 4.2 9.3
Left Bottom 4.2 9.3
Left Centre 10 17.8
Right Top 4.2 9.3
Right
4.2 9.3
Bottom
Right
10 17.8
Centre
TABLE 3: DIMENSIONS OF CUT AWAY PLANES IN PATCH
Patch (mm)
Parameters
Length Width

Top Left 6 7
Top Right 6 7
Top Centre 14 10
Bottom Left 6 7
Bottom Right 6 7
Bottom
14 10
Centre

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The performance of designed patch antenna with substrates FR4 (lossy), Jeans and felt are
analysed using CST studio suite software. The antenna parameters like Return loss S11 and
S22, Transmission Coefficients S12 and S21 and Directivity are observed from the plots and
compared.
i. Analysis of micro strip patch antenna with substrate FR4 (lossy)
In this case, the micro strip patch antenna with substrate FR4 (lossy) is considered. While
simulating the design with the help of CST software, the following results shown in figures
are obtained.

Figure 4: Return loss plot of FR4 (lossy) substrate

 Figure 5: VSWR plot of FR4 (lossy) substrate

Figure 6: Directivity for FR4 (lossy) substrate antenna port 1

Figure 7: Directivity for FR4 (lossy) substrate antenna port 2

 ii. Analysis of micro strip patch antenna with substrate jeans

The substrate jean is considered to design the micro strip patch antenna. While simulating the
design with the help of CST software, the following results shown in figures are obtained.

Figure 8: VSWR plot of jeans substrate

Figure 9: VSWR plot of jeans substrate

 Figure 10: Directivity for jeans substrate antenna port 1

Figure 11: Directivity for jeans substrate antenna port 2

iii. Analysis of micro strip patch antenna with substrate felt

In this case, the substrate felt is used to design the micro strip patch antenna. While
simulating the design with the help of CST software, the following results shown in
figures are obtained.

Figure 12: Return loss plot of felt substrate

Figure 13: VSWR plot of felt substrate

 Figure 14: Directivity for felt substrate antenna port 2

Figure 15: Directivity for felt substrate antenna port 2

The performance parameters such as Return loss, VSWR, Directivity and resonant frequency
observed for designed micro strip patch antenna with substrates used for design a micro strip
patch antenna are listed in Table 2 which is used to compare the performance of them.
Table 4: Comparison of performance parameters of MSP with different substrate materials
substrates
Parameters FR4 (lossy) Jeans Felt
Resonate Frequency 2.135 2.767 2.897
(GHz)
Return loss S11 -15.63 -16.89 -17.19
(dB)
 Return loss S22 -22.70 -23.37 -21.57
(dB)
Transmission -29.73 -26.42 -27.61
coefficients S12 (dB)
Transmission -61.33 -44.77 -41.60
coefficients S21 (dB)
VSWR 1 1.396 1.333 1.321
VSWR 2 1.158 1.146 1.182
Directivity Port 1- 3.861 2.993 2.926
d1 (dBi)
Directivity Port 1- 5.610 3.149 3.305
d2 (dBi)

CONCLUSION
It is observed that Table 4, the scattering parameters of the MSP antenna with either
FR4 or Jeans or felt as substrate, the return loss values are below -10dB which is acceptable
value for better performance. When compared to all the three substrate results the jeans
provide better results. The proposed design antenna exhibits dual polarization which will be
required for wearable antennas used in medical applications.
FUTURE WORK
The proposed antenna with Jeans substrate is designed using software will be
fabricated and the measured parameters may be compared with the simulated results.

REFERENCES
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[3] J.T. Convey, “New exact solution procedure for the near fields of the general thin circular
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