A Broadband Antenna Array Using Full-Wave Dipole

This work introduces a bandwidth broadening technique for full-wave dipole (FWD) antennas and arrays, which are realized by introducing gaps in both two arms of the dipole. Several parameters are analyzed to illustrate the change of input impedance of the proposed FWD and the moving of resonant modes. The proposed FWD array antenna shows advantages in terms of impedance bandwidth, 3-dB gain bandwidth and the complexity of the feeding network, when the four-unit FWD array antenna compares with the eight-unit half-wave dipole array antenna. The impedance bandwidth of the proposed FWD array antenna is up to 67.8% with the reflection coefficient <−10 dB from 3.9 to 7.9 GHz. The 3-dB gain bandwidth of the proposed antenna array is 51.4% with the maximum gain of 14.2 dBi and unidirectional radiation property across the entire operating bandwidth. The proposed methodology is good for a high-gain antenna array design through the reduction of antenna elements so as to minimize the complexity of power distributed network to the array. The ultimate goal of this work is to devote a low-cost and high-efficiency antenna array to broadband wireless communication systems.