Patent Application
20120313823
This disclosure relates to a ruggedized antenna. More particularly this disclosure relates to broadbanding physically small antennas suitable for use in harsh environments.
Telemetry networks are deployed to remotely monitor and control critical parameters in environmental, operational, security, energy management, industrial, military and risk management systems, to name a few, from widely dispersed locations. Other uses can be, for example, for law enforcement, commercial business transactions, medical data gathering, regulatory monitoring, real time billing, aircraft operations, transportation management, asset management, shipping, inventory, logistics, and personnel deployment.
In order to support widely distributed radio telemetry networks in real world environments, a rugged, versatile antenna is often required. In many such applications, installation space is very limited, electric power may come from batteries, solar panels or other low energy sources, and the antenna can be exposed to a wide range of risks. Unfortunately, creating antennas that provide conformal mounting with high radio signal efficiency, and are capable of withstanding multiple impacts is challenging.
Therefore, there has been long standing need for a simplified ruggedized antenna suitable for various telemetry systems in the antenna community. In view of the above, a new ruggedized antenna capable of addressing these and other demands in the community is described.
The following presents a simplified summary in order to provide a basic understanding of some aspects of the claimed subject matter. This summary is not an extensive overview, and is not intended to identify key/critical elements or to delineate the scope of the claimed subject matter. Its purpose is to present some concepts in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description that is presented later.
In one aspect of the present disclosure, a low profile, low loss, multi-patch antenna having a center frequency and bandwidth is provided, comprising: aground plane; a first quarter wave patch disposed above the ground plane and grounded at one end; a second quarter wave patch disposed above the ground plane and grounded at one end, and displaced coplanar to and approximately one eighth wave from the first quarter wave patch; a dielectric medium between the patches and the ground plane; and an asymmetrical feed line disposed above the ground plane and having a first feed branch and a second feed branch, the first feed branch feeding the first quarter wave patch and the second feed branch feeding the second quarter wave patch, wherein a lateral length of the first and second feed branches differ by a approximately N*wavelength+one-eighth wavelength, where N is an integer.
In another aspect of the present disclosure, a method of radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy using a low profile, low loss, multi-patch antenna having a center frequency and bandwidth is provided, comprising; fabricating a first quarter wave patch above a truncated ground plane and grounding the first quarter wave patch at one end; fabricating a second quarter wave patch above the ground plane and grounding the second quarter wave patch at one end, wherein the second quarter wave patch is displaced coplanar to and approximately one eighth wave from the first quarter wave patch; fabricating an asymmetrical feed line above the ground plane with a first feed branch and a second feed branch, the first feed branch feeding the first quarter wave patch and the second feed branch feeding the second quarter wave patch, wherein a lateral length of the first and second feed branches differ by a approximately N*wavelength+one-eighth wavelength, where N is an integer.
In yet another aspect of the present disclosure, a low profile, low loss, multi-patch antenna having a center frequency is provided, comprising: first means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy above a truncated ground plane; means for grounding the first means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy at one end; second means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy above the ground plane; means for grounding the second means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy at one end, wherein the second means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy is displaced coplanar to and approximately one eighth wave from the first means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy; means for feeding/receiving electromagnetic energy to the first and second means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy, having a first feed branch and a second feed branch, the first feed branch feeding the first means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy and the second feed branch feeding the second means for radiating/capturing electromagnetic energy, wherein a lateral length of the first and second feed branches differ by a approximately N*wavelength+one-eighth wavelength, where N is an integer.
To the accomplishment of the foregoing and related ends, certain illustrative aspects are described herein in connection with the following description and the annexed drawings. These aspects are indicative, however, of but a few of the various ways in which the principles of the claimed subject matter may be employed and the claimed subject matter is intended to include all such aspects and their equivalents. Other advantages and novel features may become apparent from the following detailed description when considered in conjunction with the drawings. As such, other aspects of the disclosure are found throughout the specification.
Antennas for remote applications often require the antenna's location to be limited to a conformal space near a surface. For example, the antenna may be placed in the skin of an aircraft or the top of a manhole cover. In the case of the aircraft, it is desirable that the antenna not create substantial air resistance. In the case of the manhole cover, the antenna must be mechanically able to withstand millions of vehicular impacts without significant damage as well as weather related stress such as temperature extremes, precipitation, or snowplows. Also for remote applications, antenna radiation efficiency and pattern coverage is a concern. These antennas are often referred to as low-profile antennas, having a conforming shape that is in many instances less than 1/10th wavelengths in height, the actual height also depending on the mode of radiation and directivity.
A remotely operated ruggedized antenna having properties that can address the demands of conformal mounting, impact resistance and high radio signal efficiency is understood to possess several attributes. The first attribute is high efficiency which is needed to transmit and receive radio signals in a noisy radio environment. This is due to the low power requirements for many remote systems as well as the many active radio signals found in urban environments. One aspect of high efficiency can be achieved by having low losses, a typical measurement of low loss being a Voltage Standing Wave Ratio (VSWR) of less than 2. In rural environments, the radio signal must often be propagated over longer distances which can cause high signal path losses, therefore the link budget can be compensated with a high efficiency antenna.
The second attribute is the ability of the antenna to resist damage from the environment. For example, an antenna mounted on the top of a manhole cover or utility hatch may be subjected to millions of impacts from traffic and road debris. In the same vein, such an antenna may also be mounted on the exterior of an equipment cabinet and be subjected to extreme weather, vandalism, heat, cold, water, corrosive compounds and other harmful effects over the life of the antenna.
The third attribute is ease of installation. The antenna should be able to be mounted on electrically conducting surfaces such as aluminum, iron, steel or other metals, or should be able to be mounted on dielectric surfaces such as composite materials, plastics, wood, glass, ice, and related materials, as well as combination of the two. In view of the above, the antenna may also be mounted close to the surface of the skin of a person or animal for data telemetry. In all cases the antenna's radio characteristics, such as standing wave ratio, impedance, or return loss should not be affected in a manner that would prevent useful operation. In addition the antenna should not require any installation tuning or, if so, any significant amount of tuning.
The fourth attribute is ease of use. The antenna should perform in a similar manner to other conventional antennas with common characteristic impedances such as, for example, 50, 75, 300 or 600 Ohms. Maintaining an impedance commonality allows the antenna to be easily implemented in existing radio systems, without any need for modification. In the same spirit, the antenna should also allow physical connection by common coaxial components such as SMA, BNC, PL259, N, or other common connectors found in radio transmission lines.
The fifth attribute is installation versatility. The antenna should have physical and operational characteristics that enable it to be deployed in terrestrial applications such as “smart city” deployments, utility monitoring, industrial, commercial or municipal environments such as traffic, water towers, sewer monitoring, enclosure monitoring, security applications, safety monitoring, law enforcement. As such, the antenna may also be deployed on moving platforms, such as aircraft, spacecraft, space landing vehicles, boats, road vehicles, personnel, and animals.
The sixth attribute is radio service versatility—an ability to interface with well established radio networks. In some cases the radio service is provided by the use of point to point radio systems such as one or two way VHF, UHF or higher frequency transceiver pairs. Such systems can be found in supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems and similar installations of limited deployment. The antenna might also be deployed to connect remote sites to an existing one or two way radio network and provided by cell phone providers, GSM, ReFlex, Mobitex, Post Office Code Standardization Advisory (POCSAG) or other radio systems. The antenna should be able to connect to network devices such as ZigBee and other architectures that allow peer to peer routing. The antenna could also be used to communicate from ground sites to airborne or space borne one and two way radio platforms such as GlobalStar®, OrbComm®, Iridium® and balloon based systems, among others.
An exemplary antenna that combines various above attributes into a single compact, patch antenna that is easy to fabricate, inexpensive, and achieves equal or superior performance to other near ground antennas, is now described. The exemplary patch antenna is typically polarized with the electric field vector normal to the surface of the antenna. If the antenna is placed Out on the ground, or on an effective ground plane (e.g., manhole cover) the electric field polarization would normally be vertical. A patch antenna can utilize different feed points, or several patches fed with phased lines to effect Right Hand Circular Polarization (RHCP), Left Hand Circular Polarization (LHCP) and linear polarization with both Horizontal and Vertical components. Small patch antennas typically present a narrow impedance bandwidth (2% to 5%).
The exemplary antenna described herein utilizes two or more quarter wavelength (¼ λ) patches/radiating elements and a feed-based phasing network to create a nearly uniform hemispherical radiation pattern. Additionally, with appropriate feed control and phasing, the exemplary antenna is capable of providing multiple polarizations including dual polarization. Another feature of the exemplary antenna arises from the specific relationship of phasing and impedance of the transmission lines used for the patches, and from the orientation of patches relative to one another. The radiating part of the exemplary antenna is be mechanically centralized between the two patches, minimizing the effect of tuning due to environmental changes. Also, the presence of ground potentials on an end of the patches permits easy mounting.
The exemplary antenna was created while researching means to simultaneously provide good performance on 901 MHz and 940 MHz bands while achieving a small outline. Since the exemplary antenna belongs to a class of antennas known as a patch antenna, it can be fabricated using standard printed wiring board assembly techniques, and may be comprised of any of available circuit board materials, including FR-4 (Glass Epoxy), Duroid®, Epsilam®, etc. The exemplary antenna may also be fabricated using meta materials—materials with artificially engineered dielectric constants or permittivity. The exemplary antenna may also be fabricated without a substrate material. Judicious use of coating materials, such as those used to isolate the exemplary antenna from environmental factors such as impact, abrasion, chemical deterioration, etc. are known to affect the net dielectric constant, however, such effects can be compensated by the feed network as described below.
Though patches may come in ½ and ¼ λ sizes, size constraints leads to the exemplary antenna utilizing ¼ λ patches. Some aspects of ½ λ patches are that, via symmetry, the electrical potential in the center of a ½ λ patch is zero at resonance, and a short to ground can be installed at that point. The radiating element on either side of the short will not notice if the other element is removed, apart for some coupling terms that arise in the near field solutions. A similar solution can be achieved by using ¼ λ patches with one “end” of the patches shorted to ground, as further detailed below.
Another feature of the exemplary antenna is that it uses at least two patches/resonating elements which are themselves deliberately coupled and fed in common, such that the load presented by one is strongly affected by the other. These coupled resonators provide a bandpass response, in the same way a pair of lumped element resonant circuits may be coupled to form a bandpass filter, with a wider impedance bandwidth than either resonator.
In filter design, coupling between resonators is typically one of 4 types—high impedance series coupling, low impedance shunt coupling, transformer bandpass coupling, and aperture coupling. In the described exemplary embodiments, coupling between the two antenna elements or patches creates a means to impedance match the input transmission line to free space over a relatively wide bandwidth. In this way, the individual antenna elements do not require impedance broadening methodologies with their attendant losses, and the relatively high Q of the individual patch elements can be beneficial. The following illustrations demonstrate various non-limiting configurations of the exemplary antenna, whereas modifications thereto may be devised according to the knowledge of one of ordinary skill in the art.
It should be appreciated that while the patch elements 2 in the exemplary antenna 10 shown above and in the following FIGS. are generally uniform in shape, other shapes, non-rectangular or non-uniform may be utilized according to design preference. For example, round, elliptical, square and other shapes may be used according to design preference. Similarly, while the transmission line 6 is shown as feeding the “front” of the patch elements 2, it is understood that the patch elements 2 may be fed at different locations on their respective edges or within their interior. As one example of the latter instance, the feed line 6 may protrude from a via “under” the patch elements 2 and excite each patch element 2 from a specific interior location. Therefore, numerous design dependent locations other than the “front” edge may be used for exciting the patches 2. Also, various types of feeds may be utilized such as cavity exciters, probes, microstrips, etc. for exciting a radiator. Accordingly, it is understood that modifying the shape and/or the feed structure is within the scope and purview of one of ordinary skill in the art.
It is understood by one of ordinary skill in the antenna arts that while the above description casts the impedance in terms of a 100 Ohm transmission line, other impedances may be used as desired without departing from the spirit and scope herein.
With respect to the exemplary feeding arrangement(s) shown, feeding the patch elements 32 and 34 at 45° (λ/8) offset, due to the asymmetrical transmission line lengths, has the benefit of removing the directionality found in a typical half wave patch antenna. In a half wave patch antenna, the radiating vertically polarized sections are ½ λ apart and out of phase, meaning that they constructively add in the direction along the major axis of the patches and cancel perpendicular (lateral) to the patches. The electrical displacement along the patches is visible in the far field, and therefore the antenna appears to be horizontally polarized for a far field perspective perpendicular to the major axis of the patches. This effectively creates an omnidirectional radiation pattern.
This same radiation pattern can be obtained per the ¼ λ embodiment shown in
Based on the above, exemplary embodiments have been fabricated and shown to typically offer better than 10 dB return loss from 890 to 950 MHz and, when “arrayed,” better than 20 dB return loss simultaneously at 901 MHz and 940 MHz, making it ideal for the ReFlex pager system, as well as for the 902 to 928 MHz ISM band. Recognizing the broadband capabilities of this patch antenna design technique, the exemplary embodiments can be scaled for deployment at any other frequency range.
It should be understood that many if not all of the dimensions described herein are frequency dependent and, therefore, modifications and adjustments may be made to the exemplary embodiments without departing from the spirit and scope herein. For example, depending on fabrication tolerances, adjustments, of up to 1/20 λ or in some extreme cases 1/10 λ, to the dimensions may be made. Accordingly, the term “approximately” can be understood to encompass reasonable size variations.
The dimensions for the antenna of
Consequently, the exemplary antenna provides a means to create a physically compact antenna structure that is easily isolated from its immediate physical environment and at the same time provides a means for providing broad impedance bandwidth without lossy elements. The disclosed exemplary antenna permits use of a single carrier or multiple carrier frequency, wherein the exemplary antenna can lie flat or in a conformal fashion. The conformal surface can be metallic or dielectric and the exemplary antenna provides electrically useful return loss performance, independent of mounting surface type, while providing resistance to abrasion, and other physical damage, such as that from vandalism, traffic impacts, high speed air flow, temperature excursions, weather and vacuum.
Consequently, the exemplary antenna can be used in high traffic and damage zones as that found on streets, utility covers, manhole covers, exposed enclosures, and such an antenna will adequately resist damage for an economically useful life span. The exemplary antenna can be attached to vehicles, in a manner flat or conformal to the surface that will resist damage due to abrasion and other physical damage, such as that from vandalism, traffic impacts, high speed air flow, temperature excursions, weather and vacuum.
As with all antenna structures, the exemplary antenna can provide one-way or two-way communication, when suitably coupled with a transmitter and/or transceiver. Accordingly, terrestrial, airborne and space based communication can be achieved. Additionally, mutual coupling factors can be considered in the context of a plurality of patch antennas. For example, placing two (or more) similarly designed antennas in proximity, appropriately connected, can lead to further improvement of bandwidth and efficiency. In some instances, passive ‘patches’ that are coupled by distance but not otherwise driven, have been shown to improve the return loss (VSWR) over larger bandwidths.
When fabricated with an internal ground plane the exemplary antenna can be attached via adhesives, magnets, welding, and so forth to metallic or non-metallic surfaces. Water entrapment in the exemplary antenna can be avoided by providing a protection (covering) on the antenna.
The exemplary antenna, when configured with appropriate secondary systems can be used as a radar system for altitude measurement, ranging, synthetic aperture radar, inverse synthetic aperture radar, interferometric synthetic aperture radar, radio imaging, magnetic resonance imaging, and related passive and active radar applications. As noted above, due to the small form factor and advantageous characteristics, the exemplary antenna can be “worn” on clothing or the skin and in some instances implanted into the body. In such instances, the exemplary antenna can be used as a means for tracking, if so desired. In view of the provided disclosure, numerous other applications may be contemplated by one of ordinary skill in the art.
It will be understood that many additional changes in the details, materials, steps and arrangement of parts, which have been herein described and illustrated to explain the nature of the invention, may be made by those skilled in the art within the principle and scope of the invention as expressed in the appended claims.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/281,515, filed Nov. 19, 2009, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
| Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind | 371c Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PCT/US10/57489 | 11/19/2010 | WO | 00 | 8/15/2012 |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 61281515 | Nov 2009 | US |
