Parametric Study of the Impact of Integrated Inductors on a Dipole Antenna

Background: One of the most recent developments within antenna design are reconfigurable antennas. A reconfigurable antenna is an antenna whose operating properties can be changed by a physical alteration of the antenna. This feature makes reconfigurable antennas multifunctional and able to adapt to their environment, thereby enhancing the performance of the overall antenna system. Reconfigurable antennas have been designed with switchable polarizations, multiple operating frequencies, or have adaptable radiation patterns. Reconfigurable antennas generally contain some sort of switching technology in order to control their multifunctionality. While there have been many previous designs of reconfigurable antennas, there are not many antenna designs which include inductors to control the antenna. The overall goal of this study is to analyze the feasibility and impact of integrated inductors on the performance of a reconfigurable dipole antenna. This study seeks to answer the impact of inductor placement and how inductor value will affect the tuning capability of a reconfigurable dipole. Methods:The study was conducted via simulation in FEKO, a method of moments based solver for electromagnetic field simulation. A model of a full wave dipole was created in FEKO. Next, symmetric pair of inductors was added to the dipole model and the dipole’s operating frequency was simulated. The location of the inductors was then varied while maintain the symmetry of the inductor placement on the dipole. Additionally, the value of the inductors was varied for each location of the symmetric inductor pairs. Results: The results show how the dipole’s operating frequency is impacted by the placement and value of the added inductors. Thus, the results show how much reconfigurability or tuning will be achieved via the variation of the added inductors. The operating frequency is determined from the antenna’s reflection coefficient, which quantifies how well the antenna impedance is matched to the generator.  Conclusions: In conclusion, it was determined that as the placement of the inductors change, the antenna operates better at different frequencies, which allows the antenna to have a reconfigurable operating frequency. These results enable the antenna to have a tuning ability through using the inductors within the design. When the inductors change placement, different operating points are assigned to the antenna, and within each placement, there is another degree of tuning that comes with the varying inductance values. Therefore, once the placement of the inductors is chosen for a particular operating frequency, the exact operating frequency can be further pinpointed through varying the inductance values.