A 3-bit beam steerable antenna array based on a microstrip line is designed and implemented at 28 GHz for millimetre-wave application. The antenna consists of an 8-element tightly stacked aperture and a switchable feeding network. The latter consists of a one-to-eight-way uniform microstrip corporate-fed power divider and is separated from the radiating element by a ground plane. To achieve coupled feeding, the ground plane has two rows of slots under each antenna element. A switching mechanism was implemented on the microstrip line to realize 3-bit periodic phase shifting for beamsteering. By sampling 8 feed points with a separation distance of λ/8, a 3-bit phase shifter was constructed with phases of 0º, -45º, -90º, -135º, -180º, -225º, -270º, and -315º. Continuous beamsteering was achieved from -50º to +50º by switching eight different sampling states, both in numerical calculation and in simulation. The design was verified by fabricating and testing three different prototype configurations at 28 GHz. The measured prototypes showed an excellent match with the simulation results. Notably, the maximum measured gain was found to be 13.44 dBi with a gain threshold of 10 dBi within the steering range (viz. 100º).

This paper presents an intelligent design method for a corner-truncated microstrip patch antenna (CTMPA) operating at 32 GHz using various well-known machine learning (ML) techniques. Our objectives are to obtain a gain of >5 dBic across a 10% bandwidth, an axial ratio (AR) of <3 dB, and a return loss of <−10 dB. First, a dataset of 715 full-wave simulated samples is analyzed with four distinct antenna characteristics (viz. features), along with the related computed $|S_{11}|$, gain, and AR. Using mean absolute error (MAE), mean square error (MSE), root mean square error (RMSE), and R${}^2$ score, 12 ML regression models were examined to compare the training data with the new predicted values. Next, the model that best satisfies our objectives was chosen. Results showed that the artificial neural network (ANN) followed by k-nearest neighbor (KNN) regression produced the lowest error compared to all tested ML models. The design parameters that achieved our intended objectives were computed using the predicted results. The predicted design was validated using a full-wave simulation and a prototype measurement.

A corporate feeding antenna array with parasitic patches has been investigated previously for millimeter-wave applications due to its high gain and wide bandwidth. However, the parasitic patch integration in the uniformly powered and spaced patch antenna array led to a high sidelobe level (SLL). In this study, we designed a non-uniformly powered and spaced corporate feeding network to feed a 12-element parasitic patch-integrated microstrip antenna array for SLL reduction at 28 GHz in the millimeter-wave band. In the power divider, we arranged two one-to-six unequally feeding power dividers from the opposite side to feed 12 antenna elements with non-uniform excitation, and effectively controlled the spacing between antenna elements. The two opposite input ports from the power divider were fed 180° out-of-phase for good isolation between the adjacent antenna elements. To verify the SLL reduction effect from the non-uniform spacing in the array, we designed two non-uniformly powered patch antenna arrays with uniform and non-uniform spacing. In the measurement, the non-uniformly powered and spaced patch antenna array demonstrated a nearly 16.56 dBi boresight gain and −17.27 dB SLL, which is nearly 2 dB lower than the uniformly spaced counterpart. Finally, we expect that the non-uniformly powered and spaced high gain patch antenna array with a low SLL will be suitable for millimeter-wave communication applications.

A circular polarized (CP) pentaband antenna based on the aperture-in-aperture (AIA) concept is presented for CubeSat applications. This AIA consists of five different bands ranging from L-band to Ka-band. Four different antennas, each operating at a specific frequency band, namely 12 GHz, 18.5 GHz, 26 GHz, and 32 GHz, were incorporated into an L-band (viz. 1.5 GHz) antenna. Notably, the five antennas can operate simultaneously for a CubeSat downlink operation with a frequency ratio of 21.3:1. The antenna structure shows a realized gain of 5–10 dBi with good CP bandwidth (< 3 dB) across the overall operational frequency range. That is, the realized gain of L-band (1.5 GHz), X-band (12.5 GHz), K-band1 (18.5 GHz), K-band2 (26 GHz), and Ka-bands (32 GHz) are 5.05 dBi, 8.21 dBi, 7.33 dBi, 7.97 dBi, and 8.56 dBi. A high impedance surface (HIS) is incorporated with the Ka-band antenna to mitigate the ripples in the radiation pattern created by the interference of surface waves. A prototype was fabricated and tested. The measurement data agrees well with the simulation.

This paper presents an array thinning approach for a 25-element antenna array arranged in a 5 × 5 grid at 5.4 GHz. Our goal is to eliminate a maximum number of antenna elements with minor gain loss and hence reduce the array size, weight, cost, and power requirements. Consequently, the space saved by the thinned array configuration presents opportunities to integrate additional antennas and hardware, allowing for a low-profile antenna-in-package. Our study showed that a 64% array reduction (from 25 to 9 probe-fed patch antennas) achieved an array gain comparable to a full array configuration. As such, various 9-element configurations for testing were generated through the thinning process and optimized using the genetic algorithm. These configurations were then validated using full-wave simulations. Results show that all configurations that preserved the effective area while maintaining symmetry along all axes showed a minimal effect on gain reduction. Specifically, the best thinning configuration resulted in a loss of only 1.82 dB in simulation at broadside compared to a fully populated 5 × 5 array. The exact configuration also showed beam scanning performance from -45∘ to +45∘ (viz. 90∘). A prototype was fabricated and tested for each of the thinned configurations. The measured gain of the optimal 9-element thinned array configuration showed excellent agreement with the simulations.

For simultaneous transmit (Tx) and receive (Rx), it is a common practice, with monostatic full duplex (FD) systems, to use a single antenna and a circulator to provide isolation between the transmit and receive radio chains. However, most circulators currently on the market are designed to provide 12 to 20 dB of Tx/Rx port isolation, which is not sufficient for full duplex (FD) microwave communication. In fact, it is necessary to provide at least $>$ 30 dB of isolation to prevent the receiver desensitization that is caused by the leakage of high-power transmit signals. For this reason, practical simultaneous transmit and receive (STAR) systems require additional cancellation stages. In this paper, we present a novel STAR system that incorporates two circulators, a hybrid coupler, and a self-interference cancellation (SIC) circuit, based on a Finite Impulse Response (FIR) topology. Our design achieves an average Tx/Rx port isolation of $\sim$ 37 dB over a 25 MHz bandwidth ( viz. 2.395–2.42 GHz) in simulation, with a minimum and maximum cancellations of 35 dB and 41 dB, respectively. A prototype was fabricated and tested showing good agreement with the simulations. All in all, the prototype achieved an average cancellation of 36 dB, with a cancellation range of 33 dB to 42 dB.