A multi-eared antenna with frequency and polarization reconfigurability

With the rapid development of cognitive radio technology, reconfigurable antennas are getting more and more attention. In general, the design of reconfigurabilities and impedance matching of reconfigurable antennas is individually achieved by different parts of antenna structure. However, designs of this kind increases switching mechanism complexity and the cost of antennas. This paper presents an innovative multi-eared antenna with frequency and polarization reconfigurability. The proposed ear-like structures can concurrently control and influence the resonant frequency, phase, and antenna impedance to simultaneously achieve the design of frequency reconfigurability, polarization reconfigurability, and impedance matching. The proposed antenna demonstrates that it can switch its frequency to 3.2 GHz, 3.35 GHz, or 3.5 GHz with linear polarization (LP); or it can switch its polarization to linear, left hand, or right hand circular polarization (LHCP/ RHCP) at 3.35 GHz. The simulated and measured results of the proposed antenna indicate that it possesses good impedance bandwidth and axial ratio (AR). Hence, the proposed reconfigurable antenna is well suited to wireless communication applications.