48 1

Implementation and investigation of

U-shaped aperture UWB antenna with dual
band-notched characteristics 33
12.2
H.-J. Zhou, B.-H. Sun, Q.-Zh. Liu and J.-Y. Deng
135°

11
The design and analysis of an ultra-wideband (UWB) aperture antenna

36
with dual band-notched characteristics are presented. The antenna con- 0.2
sists of a circular exciting stub on the front side and a U-shaped aper- 7
ture on the back ground plane. By inserting a slot and a parasitic strip to
the antenna, dual notched frequency bands are achieved. A conceptual

15
circuit model, which is based on the measured impedance of the pro-
posed antenna, is also shown to investigate the dual band-notched

7.5
characteristics. The measured impedance bandwidth defined by 1.8
VSWR , 2 of 9.0 GHz (2.2–11.2 GHz), with the dual bands of 0.5
3.25 – 4.25 and 5.0 –6.05 GHz notched, is obtained. 2.5
2.8
y

Introduction: Since the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)

4.6
0.2
released the commercial use of the UWB radio system [1], the design top bottom
layer layer z x
of ultra-wideband antennas has attracted much attention and become 8.8
one of the most exciting challenges. However, UWB radio systems
use the 3.1– 10.6 GHz frequency band, which includes several existing Fig. 1 Configuration of proposed antenna (units: mm)
bands such as: the IEEE802.16 WiMAX system operating at 3.3–
3.7 GHz, C-band (3.7 – 4.2 GHz) satellite communication systems and
the IEEE802.11a WLAN system operating at 5.15– 5.825 GHz. These measurement (notched antenna)
10
existing bands may cause interference with the UWB system. Thus, a simulation (notched antenna)
good antenna for UWB applications should have dual notched bands measurement (reference antenna)
at 3.3– 4.2 and 5.15– 5.825 GHz to prevent interference. There have 8
been many reports in the literature for band-notched UWB antennas
[2– 5] but few of them featured investigation of the notched
VSWR

characteristic. 6
In this Letter, we present a U-shaped aperture ultra-wideband antenna
with dual band-notched characteristics. The antenna consists of a circu-
lar exciting stub on the front side and a U-shaped aperture on the back 4
ground plane. The extended band-notched characteristics are realised by
attaching a slot and a parasitic strip to the antenna to suppress the poten-
2
tial interference. The parasitic strip on the bottom layer deals with the
lower notched band while the C-shaped slot inserted in the circular excit-
ing stub aims at the higher one. Details of the antenna design and 2 4 6 8 10 12
measured results are given below. A conceptual circuit model, which frequency, GHz

is based on the measured impedance of the proposed antenna, is

Fig. 2 Simulated and measured VSWR of proposed antenna
shown to enable discussion of the dual band-notched characteristics.

90 90
120 60 2.6 GHz 120 60
Antenna design: Fig. 1 shows the geometry and configuration of the 0dB 6.9 GHz 0dB

proposed antenna. The antenna is printed on a low-cost FR-4 substrate 9.0 GHz
150 30 150 30
with size 48  36 mm2, thickness of 1 mm and relative dielectric con- –20dB –20dB
stant 1r ¼ 4.4. A circular exciting stub is printed on the front side and a
U-shaped aperture is inserted on the back ground plane. The gradual 180
–40dB
0 180
–40dB
0
change structure of the aperture on the ground plane results in a good
impedance match over a broad frequency range. The length of the
210 330 210 330
C-shaped slot and the semi-octagon parasitic strip, which yield band-
notched characteristics, are both set to be about half-wavelength at the 240 300 240 300
desired notched frequencies, making the input impedance singular. 270 270
Usually, we take the mentioned concept into account in obtaining the a b
dimensions of the inserted slot and the parasitic strip at the beginning
of the design and then adjust the geometry for the final design. Fig. 3 Radiation patterns on E-plane and H-plane for proposed antenna
a On E-plane ( yoz-plane)
b On H-plane (xoz-plane)
Experimental results and discussion: The proposed dual band-notched
UWB antenna is simulated using Ansoft high-frequency structure simu- Fig. 4 shows the measured impedance of the proposed antenna. In the
lation (HFSS) software and measured with a Wiltron-37269A network lower notched frequency band, we can see that the imaginary component
analyser after fabrication. Fig. 2 shows the simulated and measured curve shows parallel resonance and the real component presents high
VSWR against frequency for the proposed antenna. Results of the refer- resistance characteristics. It is suggested that the input impedance of
ence antenna without notched characteristics are also shown for com- the notched antenna is equivalent to the input impedance Ra of the
parison. It is seen that the proposed antenna exhibits two notched unnotched reference antenna connected with a parallel LC-resonant
bands of 3.25 – 4.25 and 5.0 – 6.05 GHz, while maintaining wideband circuit in series. The corresponding conceptual circuit model is shown
performance from 2.2 to 11.2 GHz for VSWR , 2, covering the in Fig. 5. On the other hand, the reactance curve in the higher
entire UWB frequency band. The measured notched bandwidth is notched frequency band exhibits a series resonance characteristic and
slightly wider than the simulated result; this may be due to a large tan the resistance is close to zero. Accordingly, a series LC-resonant
d of the substrate and the tolerance in manufacturing. The radiation pat- circuit is connected in parallel with Ra equivalently. When the proposed
terns for 2.6, 6.9 and 9.0 GHz are shown in Fig. 3. It can be seen that the antenna is operating at the two desired notched frequencies, the two cor-
antenna exhibits a nearly omnidirectional radiation pattern in the responding LC-resonant circuits mentioned above will be syntonic,
H-plane (xoz-plane) and a dipole-like radiation pattern in the E-plane which leads to the input impedance to be opened and shorted,
( yoz-plane). respectively.

ELECTRONICS LETTERS 20th November 2008 Vol. 44 No. 24

 150 notches are realised by attaching a C-shaped slot as well as a semi-
real
125 notch 1 imag. octagon parasitic strip to the antenna. The measured results indicate
100 that the proposed UWB antenna not only has good radiation patterns
75
but also can prevent the interference produced by some other communi-
impedance, W cation systems. A conceptual circuit model is presented for the discussion
50
of the notched characteristic.
25

0
# The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2008
–25 12 September 2008
notch 2
–50 Electronics Letters online no: 20082661
–75 doi: 10.1049/el:20082661
–100 H.-J. Zhou, B.-H. Sun, Q.-Zh. Liu and J.-Y. Deng (National Key
2 4 6 8 10 12 Laboratory of Antennas and Microwave Technology, Xidian
frequency, GHz University, Xi’an, People’s Republic of China)
Fig. 4 Measured impedance of proposed antenna E-mail: zhjhere2007@163.com

notch1
References
C1 1 FCC First Report and Order on the Ultra-wideband Technology, 2002
2 Lee, J.N., Park, J.K., and Choi, S.S.: ‘Design of a compact frequency-
L1 notched UWB slot antenna’, Microw. Opt. Technol. Lett., 2006, 48,
pp. 105– 107
Ra
3 Kim, K.H., Cho, Y.J., Hwang, S.H., and Park, S.O.: ‘Band-notched
L2 UWB planar monopole antenna with two parasitic patches’, Electron.
input C2 Lett., 2005, 41, pp. 783 –785
impedance notch2 4 Lin, Y.C., and Hung, K.J.: ‘Compact ultrawideband rectangular aperture
antenna and band-notched design’, IEEE Trans. Antennas Propag.,
Fig. 5 Conceptual circuit model 2006, 54, pp. 3075– 3081
5 Lee, W.S., Kim, D.Z., Kim, K.J., and Yu, J.W.: ‘Wideband planar
monopole antenna with dual band-notched characteristics’, IEEE
Conclusion: A U-shaped aperture ultra-wideband antenna with dual Trans. Microw. Theory Tech., 2006, 54, pp. 2800– 2806
band-notched characteristics is proposed. Dual frequency band

ELECTRONICS LETTERS 20th November 2008 Vol. 44 No. 24