Wide-Angle Scanning Coupled Dipole Antenna Array for Heterogeneous mm-Wave Communication Networks

A novel design of a coupled dipole antenna array for terrestrial and non-terrestrial mm-wave communication networks is presented. This antenna is optimized for large scanning capabilities up to 60° in all planes across a large frequency range. A total frequency range from 18.4GHz to 31.0GHz is covered, including the downlink and uplink frequency bands for K/Ka-band SatCom as well as for mm-wave 5G radio access. With its scalable design and wide application scenario, this antenna overcomes the issue of having to design and optimize dedicated antennas for each single application. In a simulative investigation, the antenna showed an excellent performance with transmission coefficients to the co-polarized Floquet-mode in free space of −0.5dB in the E-plane at the maximum scanning angle. Furthermore, it maintains a cross-polarization suppression of more than 20dB over most of the frequency range and scanning angles.