On geometry parameterization for simulation-driven design closure of antenna structures

Full-wave electromagnetic (EM) simulation tools have become ubiquitous in antenna design, especially final tuning of geometry parameters. From the reliability standpoint, the recommended realization of EM-driven design is through rigorous numerical optimization. It is a challenging endeavor with the major issues related to the high computational cost of the process, but also the necessity of handling several objectives and constraints over often highly-dimensional parameter spaces. From the numerical perspective, making decisions about the formulation of the optimization problem, the approach to handling the design constraints, but also parameterization of the antenna geometry, are all non-trivial. At the same time, these issues are interleaved, and may play an important role in the performance and reliability of the simulation-based design closure process. This paper demonstrates that the approach to arranging the structure parameterization (e.g., the use of absolute or relative parameters) may have a major effect of the optimization outcome. Our investigations are carried out using three broadband monopole antennas optimized under different scenarios and using different parameterizations. In particular, the results indicate that relative parameterization is preferred for optimization of input characteristics, whereas absolute parameterization is more suitable for size reduction.

On geometry parameterization for simulation-driven design closure of antenna structures

Full-wave electromagnetic (EM) simulation tools have become ubiquitous in antenna design, especially final tuning of geometry parameters. From the reliability standpoint, the recommended realization of EM-driven design is through rigorous numerical optimization. It is a challenging endeavor with the major issues related to the high computational cost of the process, but also the necessity of handling several objectives and constraints over often highly-dimensional parameter spaces. From the numerical perspective, making decisions about the formulation of the optimization problem, the approach to handling the design constraints, but also parameterization of the antenna geometry, are all non-trivial. At the same time, these issues are interleaved, and may play an important role in the performance and reliability of the simulation-based design closure process. This paper demonstrates that the approach to arranging the structure parameterization (e.g., the use of absolute or relative parameters) may have a major effect of the optimization outcome. Our investigations are carried out using three broadband monopole antennas optimized under different scenarios and using different parameterizations. In particular, the results indicate that relative parameterization is preferred for optimization of input characteristics, whereas absolute parameterization is more suitable for size reduction.

Experimental Validation of a Microwave System for Brain Stroke 3-D Imaging

This paper experimentally validates the capability of a microwave prototype device to localize hemorrhages and ischemias within the brain as well as proposes an innovative calibration technique based on the measured data. In the reported experiments, a 3-D human-like head phantom is considered, where the brain is represented either with a homogeneous liquid mimicking brain dielectric properties or with ex vivo calf brains. The microwave imaging (MWI) system works at 1 GHz, and it is realized with a low-complexity architecture formed by an array of twenty-four printed monopole antennas. Each antenna is embedded into the “brick” of a semi-flexible dielectric matching medium, and it is positioned conformal to the head upper part. The imaging algorithm exploits a differential approach and provides 3-D images of the brain region. It employs the singular value decomposition of the discretized scattering operator obtained via accurate numerical models. The MWI system analysis shows promising reconstruction results and extends the device validation.

The Effecting of Human Body on Slotted Monopole Antenna in Wearable Communications

In this paper, the characteristics of microstrip monopole antennas are studied firstly in free space. Secondly, the effects of the human body on the studied antenna's performance are investigated for wearable communications. Different patch shapes of microstrip monopole antenna are chosen to operate at two bands: industrial scientific and medical band (ISM) and ultra-wideband (UWB) for wearable applications. The studied antenna consists of a radiating element on one side of the substrate and a partial ground plane on the other side. The antenna is supposed to fabricate on cloth fabric whose relative dielectric constant is Ɛr =1.7. At the same time, the pure copper could be used as the conducting part representing both the radiating monopole and the partial ground plane. The software program of Computer Simulation Technology (CST) for Microwave Studio (MWS) is utilized to simulate the studied antennas. The obtained results have illustrated that in the free space, the proposed antennas of slotted hexagonal, rectangular, and circular shapes can operate from 2-12 GHz and of the bandwidth of 10.31 GHz, 10.19 GHz, and 9.67 GHz, respectively. The hexagonal antenna is selected and proposed to investigate the effects of the human body on its performance. The human body is simulated, and its effects on the performance of the proposed antenna are studied. The reflection coefficient, Voltage Standing Wave Ratio (VSWR), gain, and efficiency are found over that frequency range. The simulated results indicate that the human body effects are significant, and the proposed antenna showed to be a good candidate for wearable communications.

Improved Discrete-Time Boundary Condition for the Thin-Wire FDTD Analysis of Lossy Insulated Cylindrical Antennas Located in Lossy Media

For the thin-wire (TW) finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) analysis of lossy insulated antennas surrounded by lossy media, an improved discrete-time boundary condition (DTBC) at the interface is proposed here. In previous TW-FDTD techniques, the DTBC formulations on the material discontinuity between the lossy insulation and lossy surrounding media were derived from the dielectric constitutive relation under the uniform field approximation (UFA) over each time step. In this paper, to achieve higher accuracy, an improved DTBC is formulated from Maxwell’s equations under the linear field approximation (LFA) and subsequently corrected in the TW-FDTD update equation. By comparing the input impedances of Teflon-insulated cylindrical monopole antennas located in wet soils, we show that the proposed approach provides higher accuracy than previous techniques.