Gain Enhancement and Ground Plane Immunity of Mechanically Driven Thin‐Film Bulk Acoustic Resonator Magnetoelectric Antenna Arrays

Abstract

AbstractCompact, conformal antennas with ground plane immunity and high gain are crucial to IoT, 5G, and biomedical applications. Conventional electrical antennas suffer large size, detuned impedance, and degraded gain and radiation efficiency on a ground plane as they operate on electromagnetic resonance and use electric dipole for radiation. Utilizing electromechanical resonance, magnetoelectric(ME) coupling, and magnetic dipole radiation in magnetostrictive/piezoelectric heterostructures, ME antennas exhibit ultra‐compact sizes comparable to acoustic wavelength and enhanced radiation performance on a ground plane. This study first utilizes parallel and series antenna array topology to achieve a profound gain and radiation efficiency enhancement without degrading impedance mismatch and quality factor of ME resonators. Notably, by increasing the array element number, 10 dBi gain enhancement is achieved in 3 × 3 thin‐film bulk acoustic resonator (FBAR) ME antenna array, reaching a peak antenna gain of −17.3 dBi. Unlike conventional antenna arrays, ME antenna arrays enhance radiation efficiency without affecting directivity, owing to ultra‐compact dimensions much less than one‐quarter of electromagnetic wavelength. Their ground plane immunity and 3 dB gain enhancement on ground planes with different shapes are also demonstrated. The demonstrated ME antenna arrays are outstanding platform‐independent ultra‐compact high‐gain conformal antenna candidates for wireless communication, wireless power transfer, and portable electronic and biomedical devices.