Abstract
A miniaturized flexible lens is proposed for beam control of broadband antenna with low deflection loss. Different from traditional approaches to phase modulation, the three-segment principle presented in this article significantly lowers the maximum necessary phase difference generated by modulated waves, thus reducing the height of the lens and antenna profile. The phase modulation performance of the lens is reconfigured by adjusting the layout of the phase modulation units PMUs according to distribution requirements. Then, a Vivaldi antenna utilizing the miniaturized lens is designed, fabricated, and tested to demonstrate the system’s beam deflecting characteristics. The experimental results demonstrate the capability of the antenna to cover a deflecting range wider than [−20°, 19°] with deflecting loss below 1.4 dB throughout the entire 8–10 GHz working band. Over the operating band, the deflecting gain is greater than 8.7 dBi.
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Notes on contributors
Zhiwei Hu
Zhiwei Hu was born in Wuhu, Anhui province, China, in 1998. He received the B.S. in electronic science and technology from Central South University of Forestry and Technology in 2021. He is currently pursuing the M.S. degree in electronic science and technology at Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, China. His research interests include microwave antennas and microwave devices.
Haojie Zhao
Haojie Zhao was born in Suzhou, Anhui Province, China, in 1995. He received the B.S. degree in Electronic and Information Engineering from Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China, in 2017. He is currently pursuing the M.S. degree in electromagnetic field and microwave engineering at Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, China. His current research interests is reconfigurable antennas.
Mark Kraman
Mark Kraman received his B.S. (2020) in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, where he is currently pursuing the M.S. degree. He has held summer positions in process integration at Micron Technology and semiconductor device modeling at Texas Instruments. His interests include RF microelectronics, and data science for engineering automation.
Wen Huang
Wen Huang received the B.E. degree in electronic engineering from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China, in 2005, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, U.S.A., in 2014 and 2017, respectively. His current research interests include microtube microwave and power passive electronics based on self-rolled-up membrane nanotechnology, soft microwave electronics, 2-D material-based microwave and power electronics, THz technologies, and passive devices for wireless communication as well as advanced semiconductor processing technology.
Hao Tu
Hao Tu received the B.Sc. degree in applied physics from University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China, in 2008, and the Ph.D. degree in physics from Brown University, Providence, USA, in 2013. He was with Brainware Terahertz Information Technology Co. Ltd. From 2013–2021 as a system research and development engineer involved in terahertz and millimeter wave imaging systems for personnel screening. He is currently a professor at School of Microelectronics, Hefei University of Technology. His major interest includes near-field radar systems, compressive sensing and imaging algorithms.
Lei Sang
Lei Sang was born in Anhui province, China in 1983. He received the Ph.D. degree in electronic engineering from University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, CN, in 2013. From 2011 to 2012, he was a visiting scholar with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Since 2013, he has been a full Professor with the Microelectronics Department, Hefei University of Technology. He is the IEEE senior member. His research interests include Reconfigurable microwave device and Active antenna array.