3012 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 51, NO.
10, OCTOBER 2003
proposed design are associated with the same TM11 mode of a con-
ventional circular patch antenna. Also note that, with a decrease of the
radius r and a fixed radius R, the higher frequency f2 is increased, with
the lower frequency f1 almost unchanged. With the selection of var-
ious radii r, the proposed design can have a dual-frequency operation
with a tunable frequency ratio in a range between 1.22 and 2.17 (see
Table I). Besides, it is possible to obtain a larger frequency ratio by se-
lecting a smaller radius r. However, when the selected radius r is less
than 12 mm, the corresponding resonant mode would be affected by
the next higher mode.
The radiation patterns at the two operating frequencies for the case
of r = 15 mm were measured and the results are plotted in Fig. 4. It
is observed that both the operating modes are with the same polariza-
tion planes and similar broadside radiation characteristics. In addition,
good cross-polarized radiations in the H- and E-planes are observed
and the antenna gain for the two operating modes was also measured.
Fig. 5 shows the antenna gain in the broadside direction against the fre-
quency f2 ; in this case, the antenna gain level for f1 is about 3.5 dBi
for a fixed disk radius R. It is also noted that the thin substrate as a
cavity resonator has a higher quality factor while the FR4 substrate has
a higher loss tangent and both make a microstrip antenna (using a FR4
substrate) have the antenna gain about a level of 3.5 dBi and the radia-
tion efficiency about 30%. On the other hand, the result obtained indi-
cates that small antenna-gain variations for the two resonant modes of
the proposed dual-frequency microstrip antennas are obtained, which
is similar to that observed in the previous published literature [7].
IV. CONCLUSION
A new design of a dual-frequency circular microstrip antenna with
an offset open-ring slot has been proposed and experimentally studied.
Both the two operating modes of the proposed dual-frequency opera-
tion are with similar radiation characteristics. Besides, the two resonant
frequencies also show a tunable frequency ratio within a range of about
1.22 to 2.17, depending on the radius of circular patch enclosed by the
offset open-ring slot. As compared with the previous dual-frequency
design with an open-ring slot [7], the proposed design has similar an-
tenna-gain variations, but with a larger frequency ratio, which is more
suitable for practical applications in wireless communication systems.
REFERENCES
[1] J. S. Chen and K. L. Wong, A single-layer dual-frequency rectangular
microstrip patch antenna using a single probe feed, Microwave Opt.
Technol. Lett., vol. 11, pp. 8384, Feb. 1996.
[2] K. L. Wong and J. Y. Sze, Dual-frequency slotted rectangular microstrip
antenna, Electron. Lett., vol. 34, pp. 13681370, July 1998.
[3] K. L. Wong and K. B. Hsieh, Dual-frequency circular microstrip an-
tenna with a pair of arc-shaped slots, Microwave Opt. Technol. Lett.,
vol. 19, pp. 410412, Dec. 1998.
[4] J. H. Lu, Single-feed dual-frequency rectangular microstrip antenna
with pair of step-slots, Electron. Lett., vol. 35, pp. 354355, Mar. 1999.
[5] J. H. Lu and K. L. Wong, Dual-frequency rectangular microstrip an-
tenna with embedded spur lines and integrated reactive loading, Mi-
crowave Opt. Technol. Lett., vol. 21, pp. 272275, May 1999.
[6] K. B. Hsieh and K. L. Wong, Inset-microstrip-line-fed dual-frequency
circular microstrip antenna and its application to a two-element dual-
frequency microstrip array, IEE Proc.-Microwave Antennas Propagat.,
vol. 147, pp. 359361, Oct. 1999.
[7] J. Y. Jan and K. L. Wong, Single-feed dual-frequency circular
microstrip antenna with an open-ring slot, Microwave Opt. Technol.
Lett., vol. 22, pp. 157160, Aug. 1999.
[8] K. S. Kim, T. Kim, and J. Choi, Dual-frequency aperture-coupled
square patch antenna with double notches, Microwave Opt. Technol.
Lett., vol. 24, pp. 370374, Mar. 2000.
0018-926X/03$17.00 2003 IEEE
A Wideband L-Probe Patch Antenna
Array With Wide Beamwidth
T. P. Wong and K. M. Luk
AbstractThe design and characteristics of a wide-beamwidth,
wide-bandwidth patch antenna fed by an L-shaped probe is presented.
The novelty in this design is the incorporation of a folded patch with
a U-shaped cross section, the dimensions of which can be optimized to
achieve an impedance bandwidth of 20% (SWR 1.5) and a H-plane
beamwidth of 103 . The antenna finds application as a cellular base station
antenna covering both CDMA and GSM bands from 824960 MHz.
Index TermsL-Probe, wide beamwidth, wide band.
I. INTRODUCTION
In the design of cellular communication systems, base-station
antennas with different values of beamwidth in the horizontal plane
(H plane), ranging from 30 to 120 , are required to serve different
environment. Due to its various advantages, including low profile,
simple construction and relatively high gain (compared with dipole
and slot), the patch antenna has been chosen widely for the develop-
ment of modem base-station antennas. A square patch antenna with
an L-shaped probe feed has a H-plane beamwidth of around 60 [1].
One may increase the beamwidth by reducing the width of the patch,
but result in reducing the usable impedance bandwidth and poor
input matching. In this paper, a novel technique based on the use of a
folded patch with U-shaped cross-section is purposed for increasing
the beamwidth of an L-probe patch antenna with reasonably wide
bandwidth.
II. ANTENNA STRUCTURE
The geometry of a two-element array is shown in Fig. 1. Each
element of the antenna consists of a folded patch with U-shaped
cross-section and an L-shaped probe feed. The two folded patches are
supported by metallic screws. In order to reduce the cross polarization
of the antenna, which is mainly contributed by the vertical portion
of the L-shaped probes, the horizontal positions of the two probes
are located such that they are pointed at opposite directions. If one
wants to excite the two folded patches in phase for this geometry,
a wideband two-way power divider with the two output ports 180
out of phase is required As shown in Fig. 1, the short-circuited stub
is used to improve the bandwidth of the power divider, which is
fabricated on a microwave substrate with dielectric constant 2.65.
Each L-probe is made of copper strip of width 4.13 mm and thickness
1 mm. Dimensions of the antenna is shown in Fig. 1 have been
optimized experiments to achieve the maximum bandwidth.
III. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The designed antenna was fabricated and tested. The SWR (Fig. 2)
and radiation pattern (Fig. 3) of the antenna were measured by a
HP8510C Network Analyzer and a Antenna measurement system
HP85310C respectively.
It is known that the beamwidth of a conventional patch antenna can
be increased by reducing its width. However, for the wideband L-probe
Manuscript received June 21, 2002.
The authors are with the Wireless Communications Research Center, City
University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong (e-mail: 50201555@stu-
dent.cityu.edu.hk).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TAP.2003.817997
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 51, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2003
(a)
(b)
Fig. 1. (a) Structure of the wide-beamwidth antenna array and (b) 3-D view
of the wide-beamwidth antenna array.
Fig. 2. SWR versus frequency.
patch antenna, reducing the patch width will result in poor impedance
matching (as shown in case 1 in Fig. 2).
With the addition of two vertical portions of height H to the patch,
the bandwidth of the antenna can be increased drastically. As shown in
Fig. 2, when H is increased to 30 mm, the antenna can be operated from
3013
(a)
(b)
Fig. 3. (a) Co-polarization and cross-polarization radiation patterns at
915 MHz in the E plane and (b) co-polarization and cross-polarization radiation
patterns at 915 MHz in the H plane.
0.810.99 GHz, with SWR < 1.5 (20% bandwidth). The measured ra-
diation pattern at 915 MHz is plotted in Fig. 3. The 3-dB beamwidth
in the E plane and H plane are 30 and 103 , respectively. The cross
polarization is less than 020 dB.
The front to back ratio is about 15 dB. Further work for reducing the
backlobe is recommended.
3014 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 51, NO. 10, OCTOBER 2003

REFERENCES with Chebyshevs array, to any desired degree, with little impact on the
[1] H. Wong, H. W. Lai, and K. M. Luk, A low-cost L-probe patch antenna low-sidelobe level. This is all achieved with much lower complexity
array, in Proc. IEEE Antennas and Propagation Soc. Int. Symp., vol. 2, compared to methods for arbitrary pattern synthesis such as [8][10].
Boston, 2001, pp. 1821. The paper is organized as follows. In Section II, a brief review of the
Chebyshev array design for uniform linear arrays (ULAs) [1] and for
UCAs [4] is given, along with the definition of design parameters used
in the method here introduced. In Section III the proposed beampattern
synthesis method for both ULA and UCA is explained, and simulation
results with these array geometries are presented. Section IV summa-
A Modified DolphChebyshev Approach for the rizes and briefly discusses topics for further research.
Synthesis of Low Sidelobe Beampatterns
With Adjustable Beamwidth II. ULA AND UCA CHEBYSHEV ARRAYS
The N th order Chebyshev polynomial on x can be written in the
Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu and Ryuji Kohno form
cos(N acos(x)); 1
if jxj <
( )=
TN x
if jxj  1:
cosh(N acosh(x));
AbstractA new method for the synthesis of low sidelobe beampatterns (1)
is presented, which enables beamwidth and sidelobe level to be adjusted
with relative independence. Unlike existing methods for the synthesis of
arbitrary beampatterns, e.g., [8][10], the proposed method is based on a It is known that (1) is monotonic for jxj 2 (1; 1) 8 N and that
modification of the DolphChebyshev [1] design and requires only a few
parameters to be optimized, regardless of the array size. Due to its much
jTN (x)j  1 for x 2 [01; 1] 8 N . The excitations An for a Cheby-
shev pattern with a given SLR is obtained for an L-element ULA by
adjusting a single parameter x0 so that jTL01 (x0 )j = SLR and map-
lower complexity, the method is implementable in wireless communications
applications requiring fast and cheap, adaptive algorithms for low sidelobe
arrays [5], [6], [12]. The method is applicable, for instance, to the design ping (1) onto the array factor [1]. This parameter, which determines
of adaptive sector-like antennas with uniform circular arrays (UCAs), and both the SLR and the beamwidth, is given by
to the design of quasi-steering-invariant beampatterns with uniform linear
arrays (ULAs). x0 = cosh(acosh(SLR)=N ): (2)
Index TermsArray signal processing, beampatter synthesis, low-side-
lobe arrays. Given that the important design parameters are SLR and beamwidth,
it is useful to define beamwidth in terms of the closest angles to the right
(R ) and to the left (L ) of the steering angle S where the mainlobe
I. INTRODUCTION gain drops to the sidelobe level.
The classic DolphChebyshev array design [1] is the simplest These angles are given by
method for obtaining beampatterns with prescribed (equiripple) low
L
0x001) 0 cos(^S )
=  0 acos acos(d
if ^S < S
sidelobes. Nevertheless, developments on some specific characteris-
tics of Chebyshev arrays are of great importance and are still under
research. For example, in [2], a new formulation of the Dolph design R = acos
acos(0x001) + cos(^S )
was presented which makes no direct use of Chebyshev polynomials. d
In [3], a modified design with enhanced directivity was introduced
L = acos
acos(x001) + cos(^S )
d
if ^S  S
and more recently a method to apply DolphChebyshev windowing to
uniform circular arrays (UCAs) was proposed [4]. DolphChebyshev
design achieves the narrowest possible beam for a given number R =  0 acos
acos(x001) 0 cos(^S )
of antenna elements (L) and a desired sidelobe ratio (SLR), with d
equiripple sidelobes [1]. Although narrowest possible beams are where
ideal in some applications such as in radars, they are not desirable
in many wireless communications applications where, nevertheless, ^ =1 a sin(sin(S ));
S (4)
low-sidelobe arrays are still needed, such as adaptive cell sector- S = acos 1 0 acos x00 1 =(d) : (5)
ization (ACS) [6], space-division multiple access (SDMA) [5] and
beamspace-time coding (BSTC) [12]. Instead, in these applications, a with the domain of asin(1) defined for [0=2; =2].
flexible relationship between beamwidth and SLR is required. Despite Since the mainlobe of a ULA pattern enlarges as S approaches end-
the fact that methods for the design of arbitrary patterns exist, e.g., fire, there are limiting steering angles S (near 0) and S (near  )

^
[8][10], they require a large number (of the order of the array size) beyond which the mainlobe merges with its alias. Note, however, that
of parameters to be optimized and their computational complexity, 0
S , defined in (4), transforms the domain of S (   ), onto the first
which increases with the number of elements in the array, prevents quadrant, where these limits are the same, i.e., asin(sin(
S )) =
implementation in these applications. In this paper we propose a new asin(sin( S )) and, therefore, it suffices to consider only one of
design method, based on a modification of DolphChebyshevs, which them, as has been done in (3).
enables the beamwidth to be enlarged, from the minimum achieved 1
Finally, we here define the beamwidth SL bounded by the main-
lobes sidelobe level crossings as

0 L ; ^  S
1SL =1 R if S
Manuscript received April 19, 2002; revised November 18, 2002.

if ^S < S
(6)
 0 R + L ;
The authors are with the Graduate School of Engineering, Division of
Physics, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Yokohama National Univer- :
sity,Yokohama, Japan 240-8501 (e-mail: giuseppe@kohnolab.dnj.ynu.ac.jp;
kohno@kohnolab.dnj.ynu.ac.jp). It has been shown in [4] that DolphChebyshev excitations can be
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TAP.2003.817989 applied to UCAs using a technique that transforms the UCA into a

0018-926X/03$17.00 2003 IEEE