A Simple Monopole Antenna with a Switchable Beam for 5G Millimeter-Wave Communication Systems

Abstract

A simple and compact antenna with a switchable beam for millimeter-wave communication is proposed in this paper. The antenna has a planar structure, and the design evolution is discussed. The beam switching functionality was achieved by incorporating two PIN diodes in the ground plane of the antenna. By switching ON either of the PIN diodes, the inverted L-shaped stub becomes connected to the ground plane and behaves as a cavity, which causes the dispersion of the radiation pattern. Therefore, a wide-angle (±18∘) beam-switching property can be achieved using a simple and low-cost technique, without the necessity to implement additional conventional circuits. The proposed antenna is characterized by a good performance in terms of return loss, bandwidth, measured gain up to 7.95 dB, and radiation efficiency up to 84%, making it a proper candidate for IoT technology and millimeter-wave 5G devices.

Planar MIMO antenna for mmWave applications: Evolution, present status & future scope

“…The antennas with beam steering capability are the demand for 5G applications which can be performed with the RF p-i-n diodes [ 131 ] or phase shift method, or beam switchable method [ 132 ]. Beam steering techniques are currently developed for base stations with large antenna profiles.…”

Antennas for 5G and 6G Communications

“…At mm-wave spectrum, atmospheric losses are high, therefore, high gain antennas are required for 5G systems. As single patch antennas have low gain, therefore, a lot of work has been done to improve the performance of the antenna in terms of bandwidth, gain, and coverage area [67][68][69][70][71]. Lin et al in [67] proposed an omnidirectional circular polarized antenna for 5G device-to-device communication by integrating electric and magnetic dipoles in a disc-shaped structure such that they have parallel orientation.…”

“…In order to improve the antenna performance in terms of gain, bandwidth, and axial ratio, a square ring-shaped metasurface is mounted above the patch antenna, as illustrated in Figure 18. Likewise, in order to increase the spectral efficiency, an antenna with a switchable beam for 5G mm-wave applications is proposed in [70]. In this work, beam switching is achieved by incorporating the two PIN diodes at the ground plane.…”

Improved Beam Steering Method Using OAM Waves

“…In [4], a horn antenna employed PIN diodes as tuning devices to dynamically change beam steering along the azimuth axis. As well in [5], a simple and compact monopole antenna with a switchable beam based on PIN diodes for millimeter-wave communication has been proposed. Another method described in [6] combined a dipole and a frequencyselective surface to enable full-range beam scanning.…”