An Ultra Small Integrated Monopole Antenna

Using High-Density Periodic Substrate Metallization

Yanyan Zhang, H. Y. David Yang
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60607 USA
yzhang40@uic.edu

Abstract
Antennas are critical devices in the process of miniaturizing front-end RF transceiver radios system. This paper
addresses a novel design of an ultra small integrated wire antenna for the 2.4GHz industrial, scientific and medical
(ISM) band. Based on a design of an ultra slow wave transmission line, the proposed monopole with an area of 300mil
by 166mil is 70% size reduction compared to a normal printed monopole, and has 10dB impedance bandwidth of
21.44% (550MHz) at the center frequency of 2.565GHz without additional tuning inductors. Good agreements are
obtained between simulated and measured data.

1. Introduction
Current integrated circuit technology makes it feasible to realize three-dimensional micro or nano-fabrication of
metallic components within normal dielectric and semiconductor substrates, and this allows for novel and versatile
design and application of slow wave structure [1-3]. Slow wave factor (SWF) is defined as the wavelength ratio of the
free-space wave to the guided wave, and is regarded as the component size reduction factor. SWF can be dramatically
increased by wounding the loadings into multiple layers.
C. Zhou and H. Y. David Yang have recently proposed an ultra small printed wire antenna evolved from a slow
wave three-layer transmission line [4]. In this paper, we further reduce the antenna length by using a four-layer
transmission line which makes fully use of space of a unit cell of the line and almost doubles the value of SWF shown
in [4], while maintaining comparatively large impedance bandwidth at 2.4GHz ISM band.

2. Ultra Slow Wave Transmission Line and Antenna Characterization

d=60mil

Grounded via

24mil

/k0, /k0

6mil

86mil

110mil

166mil

/k0

(a) at Z=30mil plane (b) at Z=16mil plane (c) at Z=8mil plane

Z=30mil

/k0

Z=16mil

Z=8mil
o

Ground
(d) side view

Figure 1: Unit cell.

Figure 2. Normalized attenuation constant /k0 and

normalized phase constant /k0.

Figure 1 shows the proposed ultra slow wave transmission line. It is built on a four-layer Fr4 (dielectric constant
r=4.2, loss tangent tan =0.02) printed circuit board (PCB) with 30mil total thickness, 6mil/6mils line-width/spacing
and 0.5oz metal thickness. The 60-mil-period unit cell of the line consists of a series wire loop and a shunt capacitor
made up of two planar stacked interdigital capacitors in shunt with a parallel plate capacitor. IE3D is used for
simulation, a method of moment (MOM) based full-wave solver from Zeland. Through such high-density substrate
metallization, SWF reaches around 14 below the cut-off frequency fc at 3.93GHz as shown in Fig. 2, which is almost
twice the value of 7.64 in [4], and about 8 times as large as that of a normal 50ohm microstrip line.

L1 L2

W1

W2

L3

W3

y
o

W
Figure 3: Miniaturized printed three-layer wire antenna on a FR4 substrate.

Return loss S11 (dB)

Return loss S11 (dB)

Figure 3 shows the resulting proposed three-layer antenna by using five unit cells of the above transmission line
after removing the ground layer. Given finite dielectric and ground size, we use HFSS, Ansoft high frequency structure
simulator, to characterize the impedance bandwidth, radiation patterns and radiation efficiency. Size dimensions are
W1=166mil, W2=250, W3=52mil, L1=300mil, L2=200, and L3=698mil. The size of the finite ground patch is
W=666mil, and L=1500mil. A 10mil-long trapezoid shaped strip is used for impedance transition between the wire
antenna and a 50ohm microstrip feed-line.

(a)

Frequency (GHz)

(b)

Frequency (GHz)

original antenna (simulated),

Figure 4: Return loss S11. (a) ground size of 1500mil by 666mil :
antenna with port extension line (simulated),
measured.
(b) original antenna:
ground size of 1500mil by 666mil,
ground size of 1500mil by 2066mil.

Figure 4 shows the return loss of the proposed antenna. The resonant frequency is around 2.48 to 2.49GHz.
Without the port extension line to connect a SMA for measurement purpose, the original antenna has 10dB impedance
bandwidth of 21.44% (550MHz) at the center frequency of 2.565GHz. After adding the port extension line, the antenna
has 10dB impedance bandwidth of 25.3% (680MHz) at the center frequency of 2.68GHz. The removal of conductor
backing insures the low-Q feature of the suspended antenna and broadband in nature without forming a resonator. For
an electrically small antenna (ESA), the ground size needs to be optimized for larger impedance bandwidth as shown in
Fig. 4(b). High-density Currents crowded on the edges of the finite ground plane play an important role as part of the
whole radiation source.
According to McLeans work [5] on the minimum Q of an ESA, the minimum QL for an ESA which is linearly
polarized in free space and the approximate bandwidth BW are given as:

QL =

1
1
+
,
3
ka
k a
3

BW =

S 1
QL S

(1)

where k=2/ (radians/m), is the free space wavelength (m), a is the radius of a sphere enclosing the maximum
dimension of the antenna (m), S = S : 1 VSWR, BW = normalized bandwidth. Based on equations (1), if the proposed
antenna is assumed with an infinite ground plane, the radius a0 is (W1 / 2) 2 + ( L1 ) 2 =311.27mil, and at the frequency of
2.565GHz, BW0=4.59% and Q0=15.4 when S=2. However, the actual bandwidth of the original antenna with a finite
ground (1500mil by 666mil) is BW= 21.44% which causes Q=3.298 and a=578.65mil. Therefore, the actual radius is
expanded from a0 to a, and the additional length of 267.38mil is partly due to the aforementioned edge currents on the
ground plane. Meanwhile, the proposed electrically small three-layer antenna keeps large physical receiving area by
dispersing the current over three dimensions, which in turn helps reduce the impedance and allow for wideband
characteristics. A factor of 3.33 in antenna size reduction is observed instead of a factor of 8 in light of a normal straight
printed monopole, and the proposed antenna satisfies required bandwidth of more than 80MHz (2.4 to 2.48GHz) at
2.4GHz ISM band.

Figure 5: Radiation patterns (a) H-plane, (b) E-plane.

Figure 5 shows radiation patterns of the proposed antenna at 2.4GHz. The proposed monopole antenna has
donut-shaped pattern and its co- polarization in H- plane (X-Z plane) has the peak gain of 2.08dB at 2.4GHz. Simulated

Simulated radiation efficiency

radiation efficiency of the original antenna is shown in Figure 6. It is seen the antenna has the efficiency of over 90%
from 2.28GHz to 2.94GHz.

Frequency (GHz)

Figure 6: Radiation efficiency of the original antenna.

3. Conclusion
A miniaturized printed monopole antenna at 2.4GHz ISM band is developed through an ultra slow-wave
transmission line built on a four-layer PCB. A factor of 3.33 in antenna size reduction is observed in comparision with a
normal straight printed monopole. 10dB impedance bandwidth of 550MHz is obtained without additional tuning circuit.
The proposed volume integrated antenna should be highly useful in wireless communication systems for local access
networks (WLAN) to miniaturize wireless products.

4. References
1. C. Zhou and H.Y.D. Yang, Design Considerations of Miniaturized Least-Dispersive Periodic Slow-Wave
Structures, IEEE Trans. on Microwave Theory and Techniques, vol. 56, no. 2, February 2008.
2. Cheng-Jung Lee; Leong, K.M.K.H., Itoh, T., Composite right/left-handed transmission line based compact resonant
antennas for RF module integration, IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation Letters, vol .54, pp. 2283 - 2291,
2006.
3. H. Y. D. Yang, Miniaturized printed wire antenna for wireless communications, IEEE Transactions on Antennas
and Propagation Letters, vol .4, pp. 358-361, 2005.
4. C-Z. Zhou, H.Y. D. Yang, The Design of Ultra Small Printed Wire Antennas Using Via Loaded Double-Layer
Periodic Metallization, IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation Letters, vol. 6, pp. 11-14, 2007.
5. J.S. McLean, A re-examination of the fundamental limits on the radiation Q of electrically small antennas, IEEE
Transactions on Antennas and Propagation Letters, vol. 44, pp. 672-676, 1996.