An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy Harvesting
An on-glass optically transparent monopole antenna with ultrawide bandwidth is presented in this work, and the proposed antenna is of ring shape and coplanar waveguide fed structure. Optically transparent indium tin oxide (ITO) thin film with a thickness of <inline-formula> <math display=&q...
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MDPI AG
2019-08-01
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Series: | Electronics |
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Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2079-9292/8/9/916 |
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author | Longzhu Cai |
author_facet | Longzhu Cai |
author_sort | Longzhu Cai |
collection | DOAJ |
description | An on-glass optically transparent monopole antenna with ultrawide bandwidth is presented in this work, and the proposed antenna is of ring shape and coplanar waveguide fed structure. Optically transparent indium tin oxide (ITO) thin film with a thickness of <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mo>~</mo> <mn>160</mn> <mrow> <mo> </mo> <mi>nm</mi> </mrow> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula> is used as the conductive layer, which is sputtered on an optically transparent glass substrate. An impedance bandwidth of 6 GHz from 1 to 7 GHz is achieved, with a return loss lower than −10 dB, meaning a fractional bandwidth of 150%. The proposed antenna exhibits reasonable radiations of omni-directionality in the H plane and bi-directionality in the E plane. Like other transparent antennas discussed in literature, the antenna gain is relatively low (−4 dBi at 5 GHz). In order to optimize the antenna performance, multi-film approach is proposed to reduce its sheet resistance, and the result shows that the antenna gain at 4 GHz can be improved from −8 dBi to 5 dBi when optimizing the sheet resistance from <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mn>10</mn> <mrow> <mo> </mo> <mi mathvariant="sans-serif">Ω</mi> </mrow> <mo>/</mo> <mi>sq</mi> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula> to <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mn>0.01</mn> <mrow> <mo> </mo> <mi mathvariant="sans-serif">Ω</mi> </mrow> <mo>/</mo> <mi>sq</mi> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula>. The designed antenna possesses a high optical transparency, which makes it easy to integrate to the surface of windows or display panels, and it can be applied for solar energy harvesting and many other ultra-wideband applications, with little chance of detection. |
first_indexed | 2024-04-11T12:58:22Z |
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issn | 2079-9292 |
language | English |
last_indexed | 2024-04-11T12:58:22Z |
publishDate | 2019-08-01 |
publisher | MDPI AG |
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series | Electronics |
spelling | doaj.art-875e64409f58492f9383b1ff2216ca7c2022-12-22T04:23:00ZengMDPI AGElectronics2079-92922019-08-018991610.3390/electronics8090916electronics8090916An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy HarvestingLongzhu Cai0State Key Laboratory of Millimeter Waves, School of Information Science and Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing 210096, ChinaAn on-glass optically transparent monopole antenna with ultrawide bandwidth is presented in this work, and the proposed antenna is of ring shape and coplanar waveguide fed structure. Optically transparent indium tin oxide (ITO) thin film with a thickness of <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mo>~</mo> <mn>160</mn> <mrow> <mo> </mo> <mi>nm</mi> </mrow> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula> is used as the conductive layer, which is sputtered on an optically transparent glass substrate. An impedance bandwidth of 6 GHz from 1 to 7 GHz is achieved, with a return loss lower than −10 dB, meaning a fractional bandwidth of 150%. The proposed antenna exhibits reasonable radiations of omni-directionality in the H plane and bi-directionality in the E plane. Like other transparent antennas discussed in literature, the antenna gain is relatively low (−4 dBi at 5 GHz). In order to optimize the antenna performance, multi-film approach is proposed to reduce its sheet resistance, and the result shows that the antenna gain at 4 GHz can be improved from −8 dBi to 5 dBi when optimizing the sheet resistance from <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mn>10</mn> <mrow> <mo> </mo> <mi mathvariant="sans-serif">Ω</mi> </mrow> <mo>/</mo> <mi>sq</mi> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula> to <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mn>0.01</mn> <mrow> <mo> </mo> <mi mathvariant="sans-serif">Ω</mi> </mrow> <mo>/</mo> <mi>sq</mi> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula>. The designed antenna possesses a high optical transparency, which makes it easy to integrate to the surface of windows or display panels, and it can be applied for solar energy harvesting and many other ultra-wideband applications, with little chance of detection.https://www.mdpi.com/2079-9292/8/9/916optically transparent antennaindium tin oxide (ITO)solar energy harvestingultrawide bandwidth |
spellingShingle | Longzhu Cai An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy Harvesting Electronics optically transparent antenna indium tin oxide (ITO) solar energy harvesting ultrawide bandwidth |
title | An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy Harvesting |
title_full | An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy Harvesting |
title_fullStr | An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy Harvesting |
title_full_unstemmed | An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy Harvesting |
title_short | An On-Glass Optically Transparent Monopole Antenna with Ultrawide Bandwidth for Solar Energy Harvesting |
title_sort | on glass optically transparent monopole antenna with ultrawide bandwidth for solar energy harvesting |
topic | optically transparent antenna indium tin oxide (ITO) solar energy harvesting ultrawide bandwidth |
url | https://www.mdpi.com/2079-9292/8/9/916 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT longzhucai anonglassopticallytransparentmonopoleantennawithultrawidebandwidthforsolarenergyharvesting AT longzhucai onglassopticallytransparentmonopoleantennawithultrawidebandwidthforsolarenergyharvesting |