Examples set forth in the present disclosure relate to the field of multi-band antennas.
A multi-band antenna enables data transmission over multiple frequencies, which in turn enables increased data throughput. A highly efficient radiator allows significantly enhanced communication range and reduces the overall energy consumption.
Features of the various examples described will be readily understood from the following detailed description, in which reference is made to the figures. A reference numeral is used with each element in the description and throughout the several views of the drawing. When a plurality of similar elements is present, a single reference numeral may be assigned to like elements, with an added lower-case letter referring to a specific element.
The various elements shown in the figures are not drawn to scale unless otherwise indicated. The dimensions of the various elements may be enlarged or reduced in the interest of clarity. The several figures depict one or more implementations and are presented by way of example only and should not be construed as limiting. Included in the drawing are the following figures:
A device having a dual-inverted L antenna (DILA) and an LC tank circuit configured to improve specific absorption rate (SAR) hotspots. The SAR hotspots are split between a first aperture defined between the DILA and a daughter PCB, and the second aperture defined between the daughter PCB and a battery casing. A main PCB is coupled to battery by a flexible circuit board (FCB). The DILA is configured to radiate RF energy at a first frequency, and the LC tank circuit is configured to radiate RF energy at a second frequency to improve bandwidth.
The following detailed description includes systems, methods, techniques, instruction sequences, and computing machine program products illustrative of examples set forth in the disclosure. Numerous details and examples are included for the purpose of providing a thorough understanding of the disclosed subject matter and its relevant teachings. Those skilled in the relevant art, however, may understand how to apply the relevant teachings without such details. Aspects of the disclosed subject matter are not limited to the specific devices, systems, and method described because the relevant teachings can be applied or practice in a variety of ways. The terminology and nomenclature used herein is for the purpose of describing particular aspects only and is not intended to be limiting. In general, well-known instruction instances, protocols, structures, and techniques are not necessarily shown in detail.
The terms “coupled” or “connected” as used herein refer to any logical, optical, physical, or electrical connection, including a link or the like by which the electrical or magnetic signals produced or supplied by one system element are imparted to another coupled or connected system element. Unless described otherwise, coupled or connected elements or devices are not necessarily directly connected to one another and may be separated by intermediate components, elements, or communication media, one or more of which may modify, manipulate, or carry the electrical signals. The term “on” means directly supported by an element or indirectly supported by the element through another element that is integrated into or supported by the element.
The term “proximal” is used to describe an item or part of an item that is situated near, adjacent, or next to an object or person; or that is closer relative to other parts of the item, which may be described as “distal.” For example, the end of an item nearest an object may be referred to as the proximal end, whereas the generally opposing end may be referred to as the distal end.
The orientations of the eyewear device, other mobile devices, associated components and any other devices incorporating a camera, an inertial measurement unit, or both such as shown in any of the drawings, are given by way of example only, for illustration and discussion purposes. In operation, the eyewear device may be oriented in any other direction suitable to the particular application of the eyewear device; for example, up, down, sideways, or any other orientation. Also, to the extent used herein, any directional term, such as front, rear, inward, outward, toward, left, right, lateral, longitudinal, up, down, upper, lower, top, bottom, side, horizontal, vertical, and diagonal are used by way of example only, and are not limiting as to the direction or orientation of any camera or inertial measurement unit as constructed or as otherwise described herein.
Advanced AR technologies, such as computer vision and object tracking, may be used to produce a perceptually enriched and immersive experience. Computer vision algorithms extract three-dimensional data about the physical world from the data captured in digital images or video. Object recognition and tracking algorithms are used to detect an object in a digital image or video, estimate its orientation or pose, and track its movement over time. Hand and finger recognition and tracking in real time is one of the most challenging and processing-intensive tasks in the field of computer vision.
The term “pose” refers to the static position and orientation of an object at a particular instant in time. The term “gesture” refers to the active movement of an object, such as a hand, through a series of poses, sometimes to convey a signal or idea. The terms, pose and gesture, are sometimes used interchangeably in the field of computer vision and augmented reality. As used herein, the terms “pose” or “gesture” (or variations thereof) are intended to be inclusive of both poses and gestures; in other words, the use of one term does not exclude the other.
Additional objects, advantages and novel features of the examples will be set forth in part in the following description, and in part will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon examination of the following and the accompanying drawings or may be learned by production or operation of the examples. The objects and advantages of the present subject matter may be realized and attained by means of the methodologies, instrumentalities and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims.
Reference now is made in detail to the examples illustrated in the accompanying drawings and discussed below.
Efficient and multiband antenna radiation in the smallest physical volume possible is a strong desire for any wireless communication application. Simply put, a highly efficient radiator allows significantly enhanced communication range and reduces the overall energy consumption. A multiband antenna enables data transmission over multiple frequencies, which in turn enables increased data throughput. In many new consumer electronics devices, however, the antenna design is compromised in favor of fashion and style and typically provided with electrically very small volume. As such, antenna engineering needs to get much smarter in reusing existing metal in the device to avoid poor efficiency and complicated RF front ends to meet radiation specifications.
Frequently, descendants of one of the two fundamental antenna types are employed in consumer electronic devices, loop antennas or dipole/monopole antennas. The dipole antenna, which is the most common, is depicted at 10 in
Typically, a dipole antenna is incorporated into a consumer electronics device by the method shown as dipole antenna 20 in
The antenna design technique shown as dipole antenna 20 in
In many consumer electronics applications, the main antenna performance benchmark is radiation efficiency. Another benchmark, SAR (specific absorption rate), plays a very important role in antenna design. SAR is a regulatory compliance metric that measures how much of the radiating energy by the antenna is absorbed by the human tissue, at a specific volume. There are strict requirements on SAR performance for consumer electronics. SAR performance is determined by how much power the antenna is radiating and how it is radiating it. The lower energy antenna radiates, or the lower field concentration an antenna has, the better SAR performance it will have. From an engineering perspective, the antenna radiation efficiency is the primary metric and as such, it is desired to radiate as much power as possible made available by the RF (radio frequency) front end as efficiently as possible, which contrasts with the SAR objectives. Looking at the radiation mechanism of a dual ILA (DILA) dipole antenna 40 as shown in
The tip of the legs of the dipole antenna 40 will accumulate positive (or negative depending on the phase) charges in the frequency of operation. These charges are neutralized by opposing charges on the opposite leg, in this case the wider leg (e.g., Main PCB 22). An E-field will be generated as a result of these opposing charges over an aperture 42 and aperture 44 in between the two metal pieces forming the legs. At the edge of the antenna, these E-fields will begin to change shape as shown by dashed lines shown in
Eye-wearable devices are different in their mechanical construction than most consumer electronics devices in the market. Typically, a bucket approach is used in assembling a majority of the smart electronic devices available for consumers today. This includes devices such as phones, watches, speakers, even thermostats. In most cases, a plastic or metal housing would form the bucket, then the battery and main PCB would go inside this bucket, and in the end the bucket would be capped off with a display. It is relatively straightforward to implement the antenna architecture shown in
However, for eye-wearable devices, this mechanical architecture is not necessarily feasible. The displays are optically transparent and designed to be in front of the wearer's eyes. As such, batteries and PCBs cannot be stacked with the display. As these eye-wearable devices are also fashion accessories, the battery and the main boards cannot be easily co-located, as the space needed would be too wide, or too thick. Typically, the main PCB 22 with critical electrical components, such as system on a chip (SOC) or a Wireless RF Front End, reside on narrow but longer PCBs 22 on the temples. An ideal place for a battery 52 is the tip of the temple at the back as it helps balance the weight of the optical systems at the front of the wearable devices. The temple of this architecture is illustrated at 50 in
For the mechanical architecture presented in
A dipole antenna 80 is shown in
Taking a step back from the over-simplified depiction of dipole antenna 80 in
Another example of the dipole antenna 90 design is the DILA is stacked on top of the daughter PCB 82. In
At block 1302, the main PCB 22 and the daughter PCB 62 cooperatively communicate electrical signals to operate the dipole antenna 90. This communication includes a controller controlling RF electronic components on one or both the main PCB 22 and the daughter PCB 62, to send electrical signals to the DILA and the tank circuit 100.
At block 1304, the DILA generates an RF signal at the first frequency. The first frequency is established as a function of the first and second legs, and the dimension of the apertures 42 and 44. An E-field is generated across the apertures as shown in
At block 1306, the tank circuit 100 generates an RF signal at a second frequency. This tank circuit 100 significantly enhances the dipole antenna 90 bandwidth and the SAR performance. The main radiating E-fields from the DILA and the secondary radiating E-fields from the mechanical tank circuit 100 are orthogonal to each other. This means the overall structure has dual polarized radiation characteristics.
Except as stated immediately above, nothing that has been stated or illustrated is intended or should be interpreted to cause a dedication of any component, step, feature, object, benefit, advantage, or equivalent to the public, regardless of whether it is or is not recited in the claims.
It will be understood that the terms and expressions used herein have the ordinary meaning as is accorded to such terms and expressions with respect to their corresponding respective areas of inquiry and study except where specific meanings have otherwise been set forth herein. Relational terms such as first and second and the like may be used solely to distinguish one entity or action from another without necessarily requiring or implying any actual such relationship or order between such entities or actions. The terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “includes,” “including,” or any other variation thereof, are intended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion, such that a process, method, article, or apparatus that comprises or includes a list of elements or steps does not include only those elements or steps but may include other elements or steps not expressly listed or inherent to such process, method, article, or apparatus. An element preceded by “a” or “an” does not, without further constraints, preclude the existence of additional identical elements in the process, method, article, or apparatus that comprises the element.
Unless otherwise stated, any and all measurements, values, ratings, positions, magnitudes, sizes, and other specifications that are set forth in this specification, including in the claims that follow, are approximate, not exact. Such amounts are intended to have a reasonable range that is consistent with the functions to which they relate and with what is customary in the art to which they pertain. For example, unless expressly stated otherwise, a parameter value or the like may vary by as much as plus or minus ten percent from the stated amount or range.
In addition, in the foregoing Detailed Description, it can be seen that various features are grouped together in various examples for the purpose of streamlining the disclosure. This method of disclosure is not to be interpreted as reflecting an intention that the claimed examples require more features than are expressly recited in each claim. Rather, as the following claims reflect, the subject matter to be protected lies in less than all features of any single disclosed example. Thus, the following claims are hereby incorporated into the Detailed Description, with each claim standing on its own as a separately claimed subject matter.
While the foregoing has described what are considered to be the best mode and other examples, it is understood that various modifications may be made therein and that the subject matter disclosed herein may be implemented in various forms and examples, and that they may be applied in numerous applications, only some of which have been described herein. It is intended by the following claims to claim any and all modifications and variations that fall within the true scope of the present concepts.
This application is a Continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 17/979,574 filed on Nov. 2, 2022, the contents of which are incorporated fully herein by reference.
Number | Date | Country | |
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Parent | 17979574 | Nov 2022 | US |
Child | 18778661 | US |