Design of a cost-effective intelligent surface structure for field reconfiguration of an antenna

Abstract

This work presents a passive intelligent surface designed at 2.45 GHz that has the capability of transmitting and reflecting electromagnetic waves that are incident upon it. The proposed surface does not require any circuitry or power source to function. Therefore, it makes a cost-effective and simple intelligent surface. It is a simple metallic structure that has embedded waveguide slots on its surface, allowing the waves to couple for transmission. A prototype of the proposed surface is designed using an aluminum foil and analyzed for both transmission and reflection of the wave. Further, the designed surface is investigated for tuning the directionality of the radiated field from the antenna. For this purpose, a coplanar patch antenna is first designed and then combined with the surface to tune the directionality of the radiated field of this antenna. The outcome of the measured performance validates that the proposed surface has the potential capability of field reconfiguration in wireless communication for Wi-Fi, WLAN, and Bluetooth applications.