Proc. Natl. Sci. Counc.

ROC(A)
Vol. 23, No. 6, 1999. pp. 736-738

(Scientific Note)

Adjustable Frequency Dielectric Resonator Antenna

C HENG -S HONG HONG

Department of Electrical Engineering

Chien-Kuo Junior College of Technology and Commerce
Changhua, Taiwan, R.O.C.

(Received October 20, 1998; Accepted April 26, 1999)

ABSTRACT

A technique for tuning the resonant frequency of a microstripline feed rectangular dielectric resonator
(DR) antenna using a parasitic disk on top of the DR with an adjustable air gap is presented. By varying
the air gap height, the DR antenna resonant frequency will also vary but has similar radiation patterns.

Key Words: dielectric resonator, antenna, microstrip

I. Introduction
Low dielectric loss, low dielectric temperature
coefficient ceramic has received attention (Li et al.,
1996; Chen et al., 1997; Leung et al., 1997; Ittipiboon
et al., 1993) in recent years. Dielectric resonator (DR)
antennas are, however, inconvenient for the design of
a specific resonate frequency compared to microstrip
antennas for its native hardness. It is relatively uneasy
to form a DR with special configurations and almost
impossible to make slight geometrical modifications to
a constructed DR, due to its native hardness, in order
to compensate for manufacturing tolerances or fabri-
cation errors. Recently, a method using a conductive
disk on top of a DR to tune the resonate frequency of
a DR antenna fed by a coaxial probe (Li et al., 1996;
Chen et al., 1997) has been reported. In this Letter, Fig. 1. Geometry of a microstripline-fed dielectric resonator an-
we propose a conductive disk on top of the DR with tenna with a parasitic disc.
an air gap, adjusted using a plastic screw, to tune the
desired frequency. It is the frequently used to tune the
resonant frequency of a dielectric resonator oscillator DR with a side length of a, a height of h2 and a relative
(DRO) circuit and has proven helpful for calibrating permittivity of ε r2 is placed on a microstrip feed line.
DR antenna post assembly. The micorstripline feed DR The microstripline of width W f, designed to have 50Ω
antenna structure is adopted since excitation of a DR characteristic impedance, is printed on a substrate of
antennas using a microstripline seems to be the easiest thickness h 1 and relative permittivity εr1. The gap h3
excitation method (Leung et al., 1997). Details of the between the DR and the conducting disk is adjustable
experimental results for the resulting return loss and using a plastic screw.
radiation patterns will be presented and analyzed. The DR studied here has a very high relative
permittivity of ε r2 =79. By using a high-permittivity
II. Antenna Design and Conclusions DR, a low-profile DR antenna with relatively low
resonant frequencies can be achieved (Leung et al.,
The configuration of the proposed rectangular DR 1997). The FR4 substrate (εr=4.4) with a thickness of
antenna design is depicted in Fig. 1. The rectangular 1.6 mm was selected for the feed substrate. The DR

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 Dielectric Resonator Antennas
Table 1. Effect of Different Gap Heights on a DR Antenna
gap h 3 (mm) resonant freq. (MHz) bandwidth (MHz)
@ S 11 ≤−10 dB
0 2074 50
3 2122 112
6 2154 98
∞ 2234 108
Fig. 2. Measured return loss against frequency for different parasitic
disk gap heights without change of the DR position on the
microstripline. ∆x=25 mm, h 1=1.6 mm, ε r1=4.4, S=3.06 mm,
h2=4.9 mm, εr2=79, a=28.2 mm, parasitic disk radius=10 mm.
has a cross dimension of 28.2 mm × 28.2 mm and a
height of h2=4.9 mm. The resonant frequency for the
fundamental HEM11δ mode of the low-profile (h 2<<a)
rectangular DR structure without a parasitic disk can
be roughly estimated from
f 11δ ≅ c ,
4h 2 ε r2
where c is the speed of light in air (Ittipiboon et al.,
1993).
The measured return losses are shown in Fig. 2.
The antenna performance under different gaps is also
listed in Table 1 for comparison. Acceptable imped-
ance matching was found with the same microstripline
extended length ∆ χ =25 mm below the DR antenna.
Measured radiation patterns without a parasitic case
Fig. 3. Measured E-plane radiation patterns against different para-
sitic disk gap heights at resonant frequencies; the antenna
parameters are shown in Fig. 2.
and with a parasitic disk on top of the DR cases at the
E-plane (xz-plane) are shown in Fig. 3. Similar radia-
tion patterns are seen for the different cases.
Finally, it can be proven that the proposed design
is applicable to tuning the frequency of a DR antenna.
As compared to the conventional designs that require
the use of different size parasitic disks (Li et al., 1996;
Chen et al., 1997), the present design allows post-
adjustments made by turning the screw, to compensate
for possible manufacturing errors and to meet precise
frequency specifications.
References
Chen, Z. N., K. W. Leung, K. M. Luk, and E. K. N. Yung (1997)
(1) Effect of parasitic disk on a coaxial probe-fed dielectric reso-
nator antenna. Microwave Optical Technol. Lett., 15, 166-168.
Ittipiboon, A., R. K. Mongia, Y. M. M. Antar, P. Bhartia, and M.
Cuhaci (1993) Aperture fed rectangular and triangular dielectric
resonators for use as magnetic dipole antennas. Electron. Lett.,
23, 2001-2002.
Leung, K. W., K. Y. Chow, K. M. Luk, and E. K. N. Yung (1997)
Low-profile circular disk DR antenna of very high permittivity
excited by a microstripline. Electron. Lett., 33, 1004-1005.
Li, Z., C. Wu, and J. Litva (1996) Adjustable frequency dielectric
resonator antenna. Electron. Lett., 32, 606-607.
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 C.S. Hong

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