Title :
Tunable liquid crystal reflectarray with rectangular elements
Author :
Bildik, Saygin ; Fritzsch, Carsten ; Moessinger, Alexander ; Jakoby, Rolf
Author_Institution :
Microwave Eng., Tech. Univ. Darmstadt, Darmstadt, Germany
Abstract :
A square and a rectangular microstrip patch element are designed and investigated in order to realize an electronically reconfigurable reflectarray antenna based on liquid crystals at Ka-Band. By using an equivalent circuit composed of lumped elements, reflection coefficient amplitudes, tunable phase ranges and losses of the designed elements are compared. As a result of the investigation, since the rectangular element has higher reflection amplitude, a tunable liquid crystal reflectarray antenna composed of rectangular elements is realized. The fabricated antenna has the ability of beam steering in one dimension. Tuning capability of the reflectarray antenna is presented by scanning the main beam from -20° to +20°.
Keywords :
beam steering; equivalent circuits; lumped parameter networks; microstrip antenna arrays; reflector antennas; Ka-band; beam steering; electronically reconfigurable reflectarray antenna; equivalent circuit; fabricated antenna; lumped element; rectangular microstrip patch element; reflection coefficient amplitude; square microstrip patch element; tunable liquid crystal reflectarray antenna; tunable phase range; tuning capability; Equivalent circuits; Liquid crystals; Microstrip antennas; Optical reflection; Permittivity; Reflector antennas; Semiconductor diodes; Substrates; Tunable circuits and devices; Tuning;
Conference_Titel :
Microwave Conference, 2010 German
Conference_Location :
Berlin
Print_ISBN :
978-1-4244-4933-0
Electronic_ISBN :
978-3-9812668-1-8
