High Performance Super-Miniaturized Antennas Using Low Loss Engineering Conductors

越来越多的技术依赖于小型化天线的进步和发展，由于缺乏超小型化天线，大量新技术无法实现。这是因为电子设备的物理尺寸现在可以减小到可以忽略的尺寸，但是为了获得良好的性能，天线仍然很大，并且按照其工作波长的顺序。在一些应用中，如小型卫星或空中平台，它们可以占系统尺寸的99%，并且不能做得很小。该问题在便携式通信设备中变得更加严重，该便携式通信设备需要诸如多输入多输出（MIMO）通信系统之类的先进电子设备以用于增强的性能，该通信系统需要几个天线，因此占用了它们甚至更大的空间。 因此，迫切需要进一步的天线小型化。然而，天线小型化降低了其增益和效率，由于内部损耗和不良的设计。这些可以通过开发低损耗天线材料和改进设计来克服，以防止其性能下降，从而实现超小型化。 拟议的研究旨在解决这两个问题，实现天线超小型化。将开发、研究和优化平面定向、全向和孔径型天线小型化的适当设计技术。具有内部谐振功能的天线将被纳入，以消除外部阻抗匹配电路，并提高其性能，同时减少天线尺寸。此外，我们将开发低损耗的工程金属-介电复合材料，以取代固体导体，从而降低天线的内部损耗，提高效率。不同的微细加工方法将进行研究，以开发合适的技术，这些低损耗材料的制造。还将开发使用喷墨和3D打印的低成本制造，以促进支持合作伙伴的工业应用。

An increasing number of technologies depend on miniaturized antennas for advancement and growth, and a large number of new ones cannot be implemented, due to the lack of super-miniaturized antennas. This is because of the fact that the physical dimensions of electronics can now be reduced to negligible size, but antennas for good performance remain large and in order of their operating wavelength. They can contribute to as much as 99% of the system size in some applications such as small satellites or aerial platforms, and cannot be made small. The problem becomes more severe in portable communication devices necessitating advanced electronics such as multiple input - multiple output (MIMO) communication systems for enhanced performance that require several antennas, thus occupying even larger space for them. Therefore, there is an urgent need for further antenna miniaturization. However, antenna miniaturization degrades its gain and efficiency, due to the internal losses and poor designs. These can be overcome by developing lower loss antenna materials and improved designs to prevent their performance degradation, and thus allow for super-miniaturization. The proposed research is aimed to address both these problems and achieve antenna super-miniaturization. Suitable design techniques for miniaturization of planar directive, omnidirectional and aperture type antennas will be developed, investigated and optimized. Configurations with internal resonance features will be incorporated to eliminate external impedance matching circuits, and improve their performance, while reducing the antenna size. In addition, we will develop low loss engineered Metal-Dielectric composite materials, to replace solid conductors, thereby reducing the antenna internal losses and improve the efficiency. Different microfabrication approaches will be investigated to develop suitable techniques for fabrication of these low loss materials. Low cost fabrications using inkjet and 3D printing will also be developed, to facilitate industrial applications by the supporting partner.