An Ultra-Wideband Antenna Using Hilbert Slots

With Dual Band Rejection Characteristics

Shashank Verma, Rowdra Ghatak
ECE Department, National Institute of Technology Durgapur, West Bengal, INDIA
shashankvermasv@yahoo.com, rowdra.ghatak@ece.nitdgp.ac.in

Abstract- A planar ultrawideband antenna with dual band
rejection characteristics is presented in this paper. A rejection
band, located at 5.5GHz WLAN band, is created using a Hilbert
slot at the centre of the antenna patch and the other notched
band located at 8.1GHz satellite communication band is achieved
by a pair of Hilbert slots in the ground plane. The slots occupy
less space compared to other slotted structures. The proposed
antenna yields an impedance bandwidth of 3.1-10.6GHz with
VSWR<2 except at the two notched bands. The antenna gain
varies from 2.8 dBi to 6.5 dBi over the band with dips at the
rejection band.
I. INTRODUCTION
In 2002, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) [1]
has released the regulation for UWB technology, allocating
the frequency spectrum from 3.1 to 10.6 GHz for UWB [2-4].
Since then UWB communication systems have received great
attention in the wireless world due to their merits such as high
data rate, small emission power and low cost for short range
access and remote sensing applications. However, within the
allocated spectrum frequency bandwidths for UWB, there are
some other narrow band communication systems, such as
wireless local area network (WLAN) in the 5.155.825 GHz
band and satellite communication system operating in 7.9-8.4
GHz range. To overcome this problem, various UWB antennas
with a band-notched function have been developed not only to
mitigate the potential interference but also to remove the
requirement of an extra band stop filter in the system.
Bandnotch characteristics can be introduced by incorporating
slots into the antennas main radiator, such as a U-shaped slot
[5]-[6], an arc shaped slot [7], a V-shaped slot [8] etc. or by
open loop resonator structures [9]. In fact, these slots produce
a destructive interference for the excited surface currents,
causing the antenna not to be responsive at frequencies which
depend on the slots dimensions and positions. Another novel
method of band rejection is by cutting slots on the ground
plane of the coplanar waveguide (CPW) feeding a planar
UWB monopole. These slots block the currents at the desired
notch frequency.
25mm 45.75mm 0.795 mm. The simulated results show
that the proposed antenna achieves a bandwidth ranging from
2.5 GHz to 12 GHz with two notched bands covering 5.15-
5.85 GHz and 7.9-8.4 GHz. The two notched bands can avoid
the potential interference between the UWB systems and
WLAN and satellite communication systems.
II. ANTENNA DESIGN AND PARAMETRIC STUDY
The geometry of the proposed dual band-notched UWB
antenna is shown in Fig. 1. The proposed antenna is printed on
substrate with the thickness of 0.795 mm and the dielectric
constant of 2.2. The radiator patch consist of a triangular,
rectangular and semi elliptical sections. Two symmetrical
Hilbert shaped slots are etched from the ground plane to obtain
the notched band from 7.9 to 8.4 GHz, and another is etched
from the radiator to notch the frequencies from 5.15 to 5.85
GHz. The antenna shape and its dimensions were optimized by
simulations using the commercial software CST Microwave
Studio [10].
The total length of the Hilbert slot etched from the main
patch is deduced as in (1) and of the one which is etched on
the ground plane nearby the feed line is deduced as in (2).
Moreover, the width and location of the slots can also adjust
the rejection bands.
L_SLOT1= 10 L1 8 Ts (1)
L_SLOT2= 10 L2 8 Ts (2)
L_SLOT1 (3)
L_SLOT2 (4)

In this paper, a novel CPW feed band-notched UWB

antenna is proposed. The antenna consists of a typical UWB
patch with CPW feed. The notched band is achieved by two Here f1 stand for the centre frequency of WLAN systems
Hilbert shaped slots one on the main patch and other on either that is 5.5GHz. The X-Band satellite communication systems
side of the feed line on ground plane. The design is capable of are centred on f2 which is 8.1GHz.
producing a steeper rise in VSWR curve at the notch
frequency. The designed antenna has a compact size of

978-1-4577-1457-3/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE

 W

H2
L

H1
H
D S
Fig. 2: Simulated VSWR for different values of L1.

y
Lg
Tf
x

Wg
(a)
Y2

X2
L2
Ts Ts Fig. 3: Simulated VSWR for different values of L2.
L_1
L_2

L_2=2L2
L1
L_1=2L1
(b) (c)

Fig. 1: (a) Geometry of proposed antenna. (b) Parameters of slot1.

(c) Parameters of slot2.

To fully understand the characteristics of the Hilbert slot

structure, a parametric study is carried out using CST Fig. 4: Simulated VSWR for different values of Ts.
Microwave Studio. Simulation results on the VSWR with
different values of L1, L2 and Ts for slot are shown in Fig.2,
Fig.3, and Fig.4 respectively. From the Fig.5 we can see that
the resonant frequency varies with L1, L2 and Ts, but the
VSWR values in the rest of the UWB band remain almost the
same. Fig.2 and Fig.3 shows that higher the value of L1 and L2
lower is the resonance frequency, whereas Fig.4 shows higher
the value of Ts higher is the resonance frequency. This
property provides a great freedom to the designers to select the
notched band for the antennas. Fig.5 shows how the peak
value of VSWR varies with HS with other parameters
remaining constant. It can be seen from the figure that the
higher the value of HS the lower is the value of peak VSWR
achieved. Fig. 5: Simulated VSWR for different values of HS.
 III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The optimized parameters are enlisted in Table. 1. The

return loss of the antenna is plotted in Fig.6 and it can be
observed that the return loss of the antenna is below -10 dB
are from 3GHz to 11GHz (except of the two notched bands
centred around 5.5GHz and 8.1GHz) and cover the entire
UWB band (3.1-10.6GHz). It is very clear that the desired
filtering property is achieved by introducing Hilbert slots in
the antenna structure.

Table. 1: Parameters of proposed antenna

Antenna Value(mm)
Fig. 7: VSWR of the proposed antenna.
parameters
L 45.75
The current distribution on the antenna is shown in Fig. 8
W 25 and Fig. 9. Fig. 8 shows the current distribution at 5.5GHz
Lg 20 which is the central frequency of WLAN systems and Fig.9
D 0.25 shows the current distribution on the antenna at 8.1GHz i.e.
H1 7.1 the central frequency used for uplink in satellite
H2 10.4
communication systems.
R 8
Tf 1.5
Wg 11.15
Slot Value(mm)
Parameters
Ts 0.2
L1 1.82
L2 1.21
Hs 1.2
X2 1
Y2 1

The VSWR for the proposed antenna is plotted in Fig.7. The

plot shows that VSWR is below 2 for the entire UWB band
but experiences a sudden increase around the two notch
frequencies. Fig. 8: Current distribution on the antenna at 5.5GHz.

Fig. 6: Return loss of the proposed antenna.

Fig. 9: Current distribution on the antenna at 8.1GHz
 For the UWB applications the antenna is usually required to
have omnidirectional radiation pattern. Fig. 10 shows the
E-plane and H-plane patterns of the given antenna at three
different frequencies 3.1GHz, 7GHz, and 10.6GHz
respectively.
(a)
(b)
(c)
Fig. 10: E and H plane patterns of the given UWM antenna at (a). 3.1GHz
(b). 7GHz (c). 10.6GHz.
Fig. 10 shows that the H-plane radiation pattern is nearly
omnidirectional around the central frequency of the UWB
bandwidth.
UWB antenna should be distortion free and to ensure this,
temporal characterization is desirable. Fig. 11 shows the group
delay of the proposed antenna. The antenna shows nearly flat
response in the UWB range except in the two notched bands
where group delay makes large excursion. The antenna gain
varies from 2.8 dBi to 6.5 dBi over the band with the gain
falling to about -3 dBi at the rejection frequencies.
Fig. 11: Group delay of the antenna.
IV. CONCLUSION
This paper proposes and analyzes a novel dual band
rejection monopole ultrawideband antenna. By incorporating
Hilbert slots in the main radiator and ground plane, the
antenna shows good suppression ability at the 5.5GHz WLAN
and 8.1GHz satellite communication band. The slots follow
fractal geometry due to which the area occupied is minimized
and the surface current on the antenna remains unperturbed.
The antenna gain varies from 2.8 dBi to 6.5 dBi over the band
with dips at the rejection frequencies. The group delay
excursion remains within 1 ns over the UWB region except at
the rejection bands.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Rowdra Ghatak is grateful to Department of Science and
Technology, Govt. of India for supporting this research under
Young Scientist scheme vide sanction no. SR/FTP/ETA-
0033/2010.
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