Biomimetic Antenna Design for an Airborne Atmospheric Probe

This paper discusses the design and implementation of a biomimetic, flexible antenna system consisting of flexible dipoles on Pyralux AP. They are implemented into a novel, airborne atmospheric sensor system. The antennas and substrate serve a secondary function as a rotor system, forcing the sensor nodes to autorotate when falling to maximize drag and decrease their fall speed. The designed antenna system works both in the industrial, scientific, and medical band and the GPS L1 band with the designed antennas having bandwidths of 100 and 130 MHz, respectively. This paper also presents a test procedure to characterize the antenna performance at different bend angles.