Design of a Wideband Planar Printed Quasi-Yagi Antenna Using Stepped Connection Structure

Although conventional Yagi antenna has the advantage of unidirectional radiation patterns, it is not suitable for wideband applications due to its drawback of narrow bandwidth. In this communication, a compact wideband planar printed quasi-Yagi antenna is presented. The proposed quasi-Yagi antenna consists of a microstrip line to slotline transition structure, a driver dipole, and a parasitic strip element. The driver dipole is connected to the slotline through a coplanar stripline (CPS). The proposed antenna uses a stepped connection structure between the CPS and the slotline to improve the impedance matching. Two apertures are symmetrically etched in the ground plane to improve the unidirectional radiation characteristics. Simulation and experimental results show that the unidirectional radiation patterns of the proposed antenna are good. A 92.2% measured bandwidth with from 3.8 to 10.3 GHz is achieved. A moderate gain, which is better than 4 dBi, is also obtained.