Electromagnetic Metamaterials: A New Paradigm of Antenna Design

Abstract

The progress of technology in consumer electronics demand an antenna having a compact size, high gain and bandwidth, and multiple antennas at transmitter and receiver to enhance the channel capacity. Over the last decade, numerous techniques are proposed to improve the performance of the antenna. One such technique is the use of metamaterials (MTMs) in antenna design. MTMs are artificial structures to provide unique electromagnetic properties that are not available in natural materials. The unique properties of these materials allow the design of high-performance antennas, filters, and microwave devices which cannot be obtained using traditional antennas. Loading antenna with the one, two, and three-dimensional MTM structures comprised of a periodic subwavelength unit cell exhibits RLC resonant structures and allows to manipulate electromagnetic waves in the antenna system. These structures offer low resonant frequency compared to the antenna resonant frequency resulting in antenna miniaturization and manipulation of electromagnetic waves helps in enhancing the gain and bandwidth, and achieving circular polarization (CP) of an antenna system. Also, metamaterial loading enhances isolation between the antenna elements in the multiple-input-multiple output (MIMO) system by suppressing the surface waves. In this paper, the electromagnetics of MTM with analytical expressions and its application in antenna design are discussed in detail. The MTM-based antennas are classified into MTM loading, MTM inspired antenna, metasurface loading, and composite right/left hand (CRLH) based antennas. The recent development in MTM inspired antenna and its application in antenna miniaturization, enhancing gain and bandwidth, achieving CP and mutual coupling suppression in MIMO antenna systems are discussed to make it useful for further research. INDEX TERMS Circular Polarization (CP), Metamaterial (MTM), gain, bandwidth, high impedance surface (HIS), mutual coupling, antenna miniaturization, composite right/left hand (CRLH).

A Compact Dual-Band Notched UWB Antenna for Wireless Applications

“…Since the UWB pulse duration is small, it is easier to get a high data rate. A high data rate enables wireless communication to work with low latency and provides error-proof data transfer [4]. The antenna has a significant effect on UWB communication systems performance.…”

Sinuous Antenna for UWB Radar Applications

“…Moreover, a variety of taper profiles and microwave absorbing materials have been presented in literature [ 36 , 37 ]. Other UWB antenna solutions concern wide slot antenna [ 38 ], tapered slot antenna [ 39 ], and metamaterial antennas [ 40 ]. The last class of antennas makes possible the realization of novel functions such as the backward to forward beam scanning including the broadside radiation, the generation of negative-order modes, and the reduction of the surface waves.…”

Metamaterial-Inspired Antennas: A Review of the State of the Art and Future Design Challenges

“…This article aims at shedding light on novel metamaterial antennas that emerged over the last few years, as well as examining their working principles, advantages and disadvantages. In contrast to previous reviews that exclusively focused on metamaterial decoupling methods [9] and metamaterial antennas [10], we provide additional valuable comments on the performance and design techniques. Hence, this review acts not only as a state-of-the-art survey but also as a design guideline that takes into account the theoretical principles and practical limitations and highlights the best designs of the literature.…”