Reconfigurable Band-Notched Compact C-shaped Printed Antenna for UWB Applications

Abstract

In this study, a compact C-shaped printed antenna with reconfigurable band-notched characteristic is designed for ultra-wideband (UWB) operation. The basic structure is a C-shaped radiator with a very small size of 8×8 mm2 fed by a microstrip transmission line (MTL) with a matching line overall on 8×26 mm2 substrate under which a portion of 8×26 mm2 ground conductor is used. The capability of reconfigurable band-notched characteristic is gained by inserting a pin diode between the edges of C-shaped radiator. The antenna design is printed on a double sided copper with FR4 substrate. Based on measured result, the antenna provides an impedance bandwidth of 3.1-12.9 GHz (at VSWR=2) when it operates at ON state (full UWB). At OFF state, it passes the band of 3.0-3.5 GHz and 5.6-11.7 GHz, thus stop the band of 3.5-5.6 GHz corresponding to WIMAX and WLAN standard. Therefore, the proposed UWB antenna stands out over the literature in terms of geometry’s simplicity, compactness, near omnidirectional pattern, high efficiency as well as band-notched configurability.