950

IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL. 15, 2016

A Dual-Wideband Circularly Polarized Antenna

Using an Articial Magnetic Conductor
Huy Hung Tran and Ikmo Park

AbstractA dual-wideband circularly polarized (CP) antenna

was proposed based on the strategy of combining multimode
resonances. The primary radiators were two barbed-shape dipoles
and two bowtie dipoles printed on the same substrate. They
were placed over an articial magnetic conductor (AMC) for
the low-prole antenna design purpose. Properly combining the
fundamental mode of the barbed-shape dipole, the bowtie mode,
the slot mode, the second mode of a barbed-shape dipole, and
extra resonance generated by the AMC surface, a dual-wideband
operation can be achieved. The nal design with an overall size of
at 2.4 GHz had measured impedance
bandwidth of 40% (23 GHz) and 49.5% (3.86.3 GHz) for
the lower and upper bands, respectively. The measured 3-dB
axial-ratio bandwidths were 19.3% (2.252.73 GHz) and 33.8%
(4.36.05 GHz) for the lower and upper bands, respectively. The
antenna performed an average gain of about 6.6 dBic across the
low CP region and 7.4 dBic across the high CP region.
Index TermsArticial magnetic conductor, broadband,
circular polarization, crossed dipole, dual band.

I. INTRODUCTION

IRCULARLY polarized (CP) antennas are widely used in

modern wireless communication applications. The need
for multiple functions to operate on a single device at different
operating bands has motivated the design of multiband CP
antennas. To design these multiband CP antennas, multilayer
or multifeed congurations have been used [1][3]. However,
these antennas exhibit narrow CP operating bandwidths and
have complicated antenna structures. The coplanar waveguide-fed slot antenna is another approach used for operating
multiple functions on a single device at different bands. This
antenna has some preferable characteristics, such as simple
fabrication process, easy integration into microwave circuits,
and single-layer conguration [4], [5]. The coplanar waveguide-fed slot antenna has two spiral slots loaded in the top
and bottom corners, and this design achieves fairly small 3-dB
axial-ratio (AR) bandwidths of 8.4% and 19.24% for lower
and upper bands, respectively [4]. For better AR operation
performance, large bandwidths of 32.14% and 31.49% can
Manuscript received June 29, 2015; revised August 18, 2015; accepted
September 06, 2015. Date of publication October 07, 2015; date of current
version March 24, 2016. This work was supported by the National Research
Foundation of Korea (NRF) under Grant No. 2009-0083512 funded by the
Korean government [MISP].
The authors are with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
Ajou University, Suwon 443-749, Korea (e-mail: huyhung@ajou.ac.kr;
ipark@ajou.ac.kr).
Color versions of one or more of the gures in this letter are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identier 10.1109/LAWP.2015.2483589

be obtained by the introduction of an inverted L-shaped strip

and an asymmetric U-shaped strip [5]. The drawback of these
antennas is their bidirectional radiation, which causes low
broadside gain and is not suitable for many applications where
unidirectional patterns are required. Cavity-backed antennas
have been proposed to yield unidirectional radiation, a higher
gain, and a better front-to-back ratio [6], [7]. However, a
relatively large antenna height is required to achieve good
performance for these antennas.
To overcome these shortcomings, an articial magnetic
conductor (AMC) was proposed [8] and has since been widely
utilized in many applications. High-impedance characteristics
and in-phase reections for incident waves within a certain
frequency range made AMC surfaces unique. Such surfaces
can be used to both reduce the size of and signicantly enhance
the bandwidth and radiation performances of an antenna. A
large number of applications of these structures for antennas
have been demonstrated in many studies. A multiband CP
operation using a multibranch dipole radiator, which employs
an AMC as a ground plane to obtain a low prole, good AR
performance, and unidirectional radiation patterns, has been
presented [9]. Furthermore, an articial ground is utilized to
generate an additional band that contributes to enhancing the
antennas operation bandwidth [10].
This letter proposes a low-prole, single-feed, dual-wideband CP antenna. For the purpose of size reduction, a crossed
barbed-shape dipole is employed instead of a conventional
straight dipole for the lower band of this antenna. The structure is backed by a single-layer AMC structure with square
metallic unit cells, allowing the antenna to yield a low prole
and to achieve the desired unidirectional radiation. Further
CP bandwidth enhancement in the lower band is achieved by
combining the extra band generated by the AMC surface with
the original mode of the barbed-shape dipole. The primary
radiation element consists of two spatial orthogonal bowtie
dipoles for upper band operation. The AMC surface acts as the
normal ground plane, with the approximately quarter-wavelength spacing in its upper frequency range yielding good
unidirectional radiation. The proper combination of the bowtie
mode, the slot mode, and the second mode of the barbed-shape
dipole leads to greater wideband antenna performance in terms
of impedance matching and CP radiation. The proposed antenna has been characterized by the electromagnetic simulation
software ANSYS HFSS and validated experimentally.
II. ANTENNA GEOMETRY
Fig. 1 shows the conguration of the proposed antenna,
which comprised two printed barbed-shape dipoles and two

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TRAN AND PARK: DUAL-WIDEBAND CP ANTENNA USING ARTIFICIAL MAGNETIC CONDUCTOR

951

Fig. 2.

and axial ratio values of the antenna for different values of .

Fig. 3.

and axial ratio values of the antenna for different values of .

Fig. 1. Proposed antenna conguration. (a) Antenna. (b) Cross-section view.

bowtie dipoles as primary radiators, a coaxial cable, and an

AMC surface. The radiator was designed on both sides of a
-mm RT/Duroid 5880 substrate with a dielectric
constant of 2.2, a loss tangent of 0.001, and a thickness of
0.508 mm. These dipoles were connected to each other with
double vacant quarter printed rings arranged between the
dipole arms. The AMC surface consisted of
square unit
cells, which were printed periodically on a
-mm ,
3.175-mm-thick Cer-10 substrate with a dielectric constant
of 10.2 and a loss tangent of 0.0035. The proposed antenna
was excited by a single 50- coaxial line and suspended at
a distance
above the AMC ground plane. The optimized
antenna parameters chosen for the desired wide bandwidth in
terms of both the 10-dB reection coefcient and the 3-dB
AR were as follows:
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
,
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
mm,
and
mm.
III. ANTENNA DESIGN PROCESS
A. Crossed Barbed-Shape Dipoles and Crossed Bowtie
Dipoles Over a Metallic Reflector
The antenna was rst investigated over a metallic reector to
explain the basic operation mechanism. As mentioned above,
the proposed antenna exhibited a dual-band characteristic. We
rst studied the lower band operation at 2.4 GHz, which was
produced by the crossed barbed-shape dipole. Instead of using a
conventional straight dipole, a barbed-shape dipole was chosen
to realize a compact size. As shown in Fig. 2, the value of signicantly affected the antenna features in the lower band, and
the increase of led to a downward movement of the antenna
operation bandwidths for the impedance matching and AR aspects. While in the
prole, the antenna exhibited two resonances. Based on the mechanism described in [11], the proper

adjustments of dipole length and ring size were able to excite

CP waves at the desired frequency. The variation of resulted
in only a minor effect on the upper band operation; thus, it is not
mentioned here.
A bowtie structure was considered as a primary radiation element for the upper frequency band due to its wideband characteristic of wide are angle conguration. The crossed bowtie
dipole antenna [11] was able to achieve a wide CP operation
bandwidth by using a suitable combination of the fundamental
bowtie dipole mode and the orthogonal slot mode formed by the
gap between each bowtie arm. The antenna performances for
different values of the bowties length are shown in Fig. 3.
Evidently, decreasing made the bowtie become shorter, and it
reduced the slot size in equal measure. Thus, the antenna operation shifted toward the higher frequency band. In the AR prole,
the antenna exhibited three resonances. One of the two lower
CP resonances was generated by crossed bowtie dipoles, and the
other by the orthogonal slots. Further detailed explanation about
these CP radiation mechanisms can be found in the study [11].
The highest CP resonance occurred at around 5.9 GHz; this resonance remained unchanged, as it was produced by the second
mode of the barbed-shape dipole. This second mode was utilized to enhance the AR bandwidth of the upper band operation.
Moreover, the variation of did not inuence the operation of
the lower frequency band at 2.4 GHz; as such, this variation will
not be presented in the results.
The HFSS simulations for different heights
between the
reector and radiator illustrated that when the value of

952

Fig. 4. (a)
congurations.

IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL. 15, 2016

and (b) axial ratio values of the different antenna

Fig. 5. Simulated and measured

mm (
of the rst CP band at 4.6 GHz in the upper
frequency band), the antenna exhibited the best performances
in terms of impedance matching and AR bandwidths for upper
band operation. However, the distance from the antenna to the
reector in the lower band (2.4 GHz) was less than a quarterwavelength. This resulted in poor antenna performances around
this frequency band caused by the image current effect.
B. Crossed Barbed-Shape Dipoles and Crossed Bowtie
Dipoles Over the AMC
To achieve better antenna characteristics at 2.4 GHz, the
AMC ground plane was employed as a replacement for the
metallic reector because of its unique reection-phase feature
that varied continuously from to
depending on frequency.
Study [8] demonstrated that the phase ranged from
to
with the magnitude of the surface impedance exceeded
the impedance of free space produces in-phase image currents
rather than out-of-phase image currents. Thus, it allowed
antenna elements to lie directly adjacent to the AMC surface
without being shorted out. Moreover, by properly combining
the directly radiated wave from the antenna with the reected
wave from the AMC structure, broadband operation features
were obtained. We designed and utilized an AMC surface that
worked in the frequency range of 22.7 GHz. The antenna
designed with the AMC ground plane is shown in Fig. 1, while
its characteristics are shown in Fig. 4, which compares this
antenna to the antenna that was used over the metallic reector.
Obviously, the antenna used over the AMC reector achieved
better performance in the lower band than the antenna used
over the metallic reector. In terms of impedance bandwidth,
the antenna yielded a wide operation of 36.7% (22.9 GHz) and
48% (3.86.2 GHz) at the lower and upper bands, respectively.
For the AR response in the lower band, the antenna used over
the metallic reector exhibited only one CP resonance radiated
by the fundamental mode of a barbed-shape dipole. When the
AMC reector was utilized, the antenna achieved a much better
performance of 20% (2.252.75 GHz) with an additional CP
band at 2.7 GHz generated by the AMC ground plane. It is also
noted that the additional CP band can be controlled by changing
the AMC size and decreasing the number of AMC cells made
this CP resonance shift upwards [12]. In the upper band, the
proposed antenna over the AMC and PEC reectors showed

Fig. 6. Simulated and measured broadside gain of the antenna.

insignicant differences in the reection coefcient and axial

ratio characteristics. Specically, the antenna over the AMC
reector achieved an AR bandwidth of 35.7% (4.256.1 GHz)
with three CP frequencies of 4.58, 5.4, and 6 GHz produced
by the bowtie mode, slot mode, and second mode of the
barbed-shape dipole.
IV. SIMULATION AND MEASUREMENT RESULTS
The proposed dual-wideband AMC-backed CP antenna was
fabricated and measured. The designed radiator was printed on
both sides of a
-mm RT/Duroid 5880 via standard
wet-etching technology. The AMC-backed reector was constructed with
square metallic plates printed on an
-mm Cer-10 substrate. An SMA connector was used at the
input port to feed the radiator. An Agilent N5230A network analyzer and a 3.5-mm coaxial calibration standard GCS35M were
used for the input impedance measurement of the prototype.
Another Agilent E8362B network analyzer and a full anechoic
chamber with the following dimensions were used to measure
the radiation patterns:
m
m
m
.
Fig. 5 shows a comparison between the measured and simulated reection coefcients for the proposed antenna. The simulated impedance bandwidths for
dB were 36.7%
(22.9 GHz) and 48% (3.86.2 GHz), while the measurement
results indicated that the antenna prototype could achieve a wide
bandwidth of 40% (23 GHz) and 49.5% (3.86.3 GHz) at the
lower and upper bands, respectively. Measured and simulated
ARs are presented in Fig. 6. The measured 3-dB AR bandwidths

TRAN AND PARK: DUAL-WIDEBAND CP ANTENNA USING ARTIFICIAL MAGNETIC CONDUCTOR

953

V. CONCLUSION
This letter proposed a dual-band crossed dipole on an AMC
reector with wideband characteristics of AR and impedance
bandwidths. The antenna was composed of barbed-shape
dipoles and bowtie dipoles and placed over a nite AMC
surface. The measured results agreed well with the simulation
results, showing that the antenna has wide AR (
dB)
bandwidths of 19.3% and 33.8% in the lower and upper bands,
respectively, and impedance bandwidths (
dB) of
40% and 49.5% in the lower and upper bands, respectively.
The average gains for these bands were 6.6 and 7.4 dBic in
the lower and upper bands, respectively, and the antenna also
showed good right-handed CP (RHCP) radiation patterns in the
broadside direction.
REFERENCES

Fig. 7. Radiation patterns of the antenna at (a) 2.4, (b) 5.2, and (c) 5.8 GHz.

were approximately 19.3% from 2.252.73 GHz in the lower

band and 33.8% from 4.36.05 GHz in the upper band. The
congruence between the simulated and measured AR curves
was observed. The antenna gain was simulated and validated
by measuring in the boresight direction as a function of the frequency, as shown in Fig. 6. The measured values within the
3-dB AR bandwidths ranged from 5.97.2 and 5.99 dBic in the
lower and upper bands, respectively. The radiation patterns of
the proposed antenna were examined at different frequencies in
and
) and are plotted
the two principal planes (
in Fig. 7. The measurements agree well with the HFSS simulations. The radiation patterns at 2.4 GHz were considered for the
lower band. The measurements yielded a gain of 6.9 dBic and
a front-to-back ratio of 14.8 dB. For the upper band, the radiation patterns at 5.2 and 5.8 GHz were considered. For 5.2 GHz,
the measurements yielded a gain of 8.5 dBic and a front-to-back
ratio of 14.5 dB. For 5.2 GHz, they yielded a gain of 6.5 dBic
and a front-to-back ratio of 12.4 dB.

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