Design of Sub-THZ Beam Scanning Antenna Using Luneburg Lens for 5g Communications or Beyond

Abstract

This work presents the design and simulation of a beam scanning antenna at 300 GHz using Luneburg lens for 5th generation communication applications or beyond. The basic antenna consists of a highly directional Yagi-Uda antenna with lens shaped configuration (substrate lens antenna-SLA) and designed using multiple parallel elements such as one reflector and one driven element with 6 directors. The SLA is focused by Luneburg lens, which is modeled using a unique foam material AirexR82 with relative dielectric constant of 1.12, and it is pressed to realize different dielectric constants in order to obey the index law inside the lens. The final nine-element array of SLA integrated with Luneburg lens provides a 50% increase in bandwidth compared with conventional Yagi-Uda antenna along with an increase in the gain of 31.3% compared with single SLA. The designed model can achieve a beam scan coverage up to 146 • with a maximum gain of 17.1 dBi and an estimated efficiency of 92.9%. The beam scanning antenna provides a wide bandwidth of 83 GHz starting from 289 GHz to 372 GHz. The analysis of the proposed antenna is done in CST suite and is validated using HFSS software.

Multi resonant slot antenna design to radiate fan‐shaped multi‐beam radiation pattern with the use of two‐dimensional perforated Luneburg lens

“…Beam steering is highly regarded by industrialists in the millimeter-wave range, especially in the military and civilian fields such as 5G millimeter-wave band, [1][2][3] radar systems, navigation, and automotive industries. [4][5][6] In automotive applications, such as blind-spot detection, collision warning, and pre-crash vehicle preparation wide-angle beam scanning with narrow beam widths and high gain is important.…”

“…Several works use multiple antennas around the Luneburg lens to scan a target in space. 2,6,46,47 The plated form of the Luneburg lens 3,[40][41][42][43] is presented for fanbeam scanning in the horizontal plane. The fan-beam radiation pattern is necessary to search for a target in radar applications at microwave and millimeter frequency bands.…”

“…Several works use multiple antennas around the Luneburg lens to scan a target in space 2,6,46,47 . The plated form of the Luneburg lens 3,40–43 is presented for fan‐beam scanning in the horizontal plane.…”