Low-Profile Compact Microstrip Magnetic Dipole Antenna with Large Beamwidth and Broad Bandwidth for Vehicular Applications

In this paper, low-profile compact microstrip magnetic dipole antennas with large beamwidth and broad bandwidth are proposed for vehicular applications. At first, by introducing a strip on the bottom layer of microstrip magnetic dipole antenna, the electric current sources are introduced for the enhancement of beamwidth together with the magnetic current source. The operation principle of an equivalent complementary source model is then revealed to provide a physical insight. As seen, the half-power beamwidth (HPBW) can be controllable and effectively enlarged by the electric length of the planar magnetic dipole antenna. Next, by using a stub crossing on the strip, the impedance bandwidth is significantly improved comparing with the unloaded counterpart. After that, the antenna size is miniaturized by etching a pair of slots to extend the length of current path. Experimental results indicate that, under a very low profile of 0.016λ0 and 0.032λ0, the antenna prototypes can still achieve an impedance bandwidth of 14.5% and 20.8%, and a maximum HPBW of 99° (E-plane)/180° (H-plane) and 112° (E-plane)/159° (H-plane). It is also demonstrated that when the antenna size is reduced to 0.442λ0×0.284λ0, the impedance bandwidth up to 14.9% and the maximum HPBW of 93° (E-plane)/231° (H-plane) can be guaranteed with a low profile about 0.032λ0. Comparing with other design approaches, the proposed designs feature a very low profile structure, and superior beamwidth and bandwidth properties, as well as simple configuration and compact size.