A dual-band linear phased array antenna for WiFi and LTE mobile applications

This paper presents a linear phased array antenna with beam steering capability designed for WiFi and LTE mobile standards. The proposed antenna array utilizes 4 elements of patch antenna arranged in a flat configuration. The antenna element used in the array exhibits dual band characteristic covering 2 wide frequency bands; 2.35 GHz to 2.8 GHz (lower band) and 5 GHz to 5.5 GHz (upper band). To excite dual resonances, a rectangular ring slot was cut in the ground plane of the rectangular patch. The upper patch acts as the feeding element for the rectangular ring slot for lower band operation and as a radiator at the upper frequency band. The simulation results show a bi-directional radiation pattern at the lower frequency band and unidirectional at the upper band. By varying the phase of the individual antenna elements, the main beam of the proposed linear array can be steered to a range of ±40° for the lower band and ±22° for the upper band with side lobe level (SLL) and half-power beam width (HPBW) less than -7 dBi and 43° respectively. The array is intended to be fed by a corporate feeding network using three wideband 3-port Wilkinson power dividers. A FR4 (1.6 mm) is used as the antenna substrate and the feeding element. The overall size of the proposed array and the feeding element is 155 mm × 35 mm × 1.6 mm and 155 mm × 83 mm × 1.6 mm respectively. The designs and simulations have been carried out using CST Microwave Studio. The presented array antenna can be particularly applied to small and portable mobile base stations.