To understand the radiation mechanism of an electrically small spherical helix antenna, we develop a theory on the radiation characteristics of the antenna. An analytical model of the antenna presuming a current on the wire to be sinusoidally distributed is proposed and analyzed with the spherical wave expansion. The radiation efficiency, radiation resistance, and radiation patterns are obtained in closed-form expression. The radiation efficiency evidently varies with the surface area of the wire and the radiation resistance depends on the square of the length of the wire. The obtained result for the radiation pattern illustrates the tilt of the pattern caused by the modes asymmetric to the z-axis. The radiation efficiency formula indicates a good agreement between the simulation and measurement result. In addition, the radiation resistance of the theoretical and simulation results exhibits good agreement. Considering the effect of the feeding structure of the fabricated antenna, the radiation resistance of the analytical model can be treated as a reasonable result. The result of radiation pattern also shows good agreement between the simulation and measurement results excluding a small contribution from the feeding cable acting as a scatterer.

Platform-mounted small antennas increase dielectric loss and conductive loss and decrease the radiation efficiency. This paper proposes a novel antenna design method to improve radiation efficiency for platform-mounted small antennas by characteristic mode analysis. The proposed method uses mapping of modal weighting coefficient (MWC) and infinitesimal dipole and evaluate the metal casing with 100mm × 55mm × 23mm as a platform excited by an inverted-F antenna. The simulation and measurement results show that the radiation efficiency of 5% is improved with the whole system from 2.5% of the single antenna.

For the realization of a high-efficiency antenna for 60GHz-band wireless personal area network, we propose placing a CMOS RF circuit and an antenna on opposing sides of a silicon chip. They are connected with low loss by a coaxial-line structure using a hole opening in the chip. Since the CMOS circuit is driven differentially, a differential-feed antenna is used. In this paper, we design and measure a differential-feed square patch antenna on a silicon chip. To enhance the radiation efficiency, it is placed on a 200µm thick resin layer. The calculated radiation efficiency of 79% includes the connection loss. A prototype antenna is measured in a reverberation chamber, and its radiation efficiency is estimated to be about 81±3%.

Maximum radiation efficiency has been derived for homogeneous electrically small antennas. The spherical wave expansion is utilized to express the radiated field and the current distribution on an antenna, and the radiation efficiency is represented by the current, which is expressed in the spherical wave expansion coefficients and the nonradiating current. By using a concept of the nonradiating current, it is shown that the maximum radiation efficiency is achieved if the antenna shape is spherical. The radiation efficiency of a spherical antenna is maximized by varying the expansion coefficients. This radiation efficiency is compared with that of the antenna which achieves the maximum gain and those of linear antennas. The comparison indicates the validity of our proposed upper limit of the radiation efficiency.

As a first step towards the realization of high-efficiency on-chip antennas for 60GHz-band wireless personal area networks, this paper proposes the fabrication of a patch antenna placed on a 200µm thick dielectric resin and fed through a hole in a silicon chip. Despite the large tan δ of the adopted material (0.015 at 50GHz), the thick resin reduces the conductor loss at the radiating element and a radiation efficiency of 78%, which includes the connecting loss from the bottom is predicted by simulation. This calculated value is verified in the millimeter-wave band by experiments in a reverberation chamber. Six stirrers are installed, one on each wall in the chamber, to create a statistical Rayleigh environment. The manufactured prototype antenna with a test jig demonstrates the radiation efficiency of 75% in the reverberation chamber. This agrees well with the simulated value of 76%, while the statistical measurement uncertainty of our handmade reverberation chamber is calculated as ±0.14dB.

The reflection method is an accurate and simple method for measuring the radiation efficiency of a small antenna. However, it takes too long and has the disadvantage of underestimating the efficiency due to resonance in the cavity formed by the straight waveguide and two sliding shorts. To reduce the measurement time, one sliding short can be fixed while the other one is moved. To improve the accuracy of this technique, we can set the antenna to be measured at the center of the two sliding shorts or at a local anti-node of the standing wave in the waveguide. When one of the sliding shorts is fixed, the measured efficiency becomes negative at certain frequencies. We examine these reductions in efficiency using an equivalent transmission line model for the reflection method. We also derive analytical expressions for the overall efficiency in the above cases and verify new procedures that enable measurements to be performed without any drops in the measured efficiency.

In this paper, we present the classification of small antennas based on statistical data. The three categories of downsizing methods are loading a matching circuit, changing the current path, and using dielectric/magnetic materials. These categories are explained using several examples. In this paper, we show that the miminum Q value as a fundamental limit defined by an infinitesimal dipole is effective for determining the index factor of small antennas. Radiation efficiency measurements for small antennas are also discussed.

This paper analyzes the effective radiation efficiency of a ground-penetrating radar (GPR) consisting of two resistor-loaded bow-tie antennas covered with a ferrite-coated conducting cavity by using finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. The GPR is located above a lossless or lossy ground surface. The relation between the radiation powers into the ground and air, dissipated powers at the loaded resistors and ferrite absorber, and the reflected power due to impedance mismatching, is clarified numerically.

A simple method based on the pattern integration method for measuring the power absorption by human model in the vicinity of antennas is proposed. Good agreement between the measured and the numerical results is obtained conforming the validity of the present measurement method. The equipment is useful in the EMC measurement and research of the antennas for the portable telephone.

The propagation characteristics of dielectric waveguides with slanted grating structure are analyzed by using the combination of the improved Fourier series expansion method and the approximated multilayer method. The slanted grating region is appoximated by a structure with stratified thin modulated index layers. This method is effective to the guiding problems of the planar slanted grating, because the electromagnetic fields in each layer can be expressed by shifting the phase of the solution in the first layer. In this paper, numerical results are given for the grating with the rectangular and the sinusoidal profile for arbitrary slant angle. The radiation efficiencies for the grating with negative and positive slant angle are also discussed.

In this paper, we analyze high-Tc superconducting (HTS) microstrip antenna (MSA) using modified spectral domain moment method. Although it is assumed that the patch and the ground plane of the MSA are perfect electric conductors (PECs) in the conventional spectral domain method, we modify this method to compute the conduction loss of the HTS-MSA. In our analysis, the effect of the HTS film is introduced by the surface impedance which we can estimate by using the three fluid model and experimental results. This paper presents numerical results about the HTS-MSA, for example, the relations between the thickness of the substrate and the radiation efficiency, the temperature and the resonant frequency, and so forth. And we discuss the effective power range where the performance of the HTS-MSA is superior to that of the Cu-MSA.

A theoretical and experimental study of a thin card-sized antenna is presented. The method of moment with a wire-grid model is used to analyze this antenna. In order to validate numerical efficiency, measurements using Wheeler method are preformed on this antenna and its wire-grid models. The experimental and theoretical results are in good agreement if the wire conductivity is well chosen. And the noise reduction of measured Wheeler efficiency using least mean square method is also examined.