A magneto-electric dipole antenna with low-profile and simple structure

By combining a horizontal planar dipole and a vertically oriented folded shorted patch antenna, a new low-profile magneto-electric dipole antenna is presented. The antenna is simply excited by a coaxial feed that works as a balun. A prototype was fabricated and measured. Simulated and measured results agree well. An impedance bandwidthof45.6% for SWR <from 1.86 to 2.96 GHz was achieved. Stable radiation pattern with low cross polarization, low back radiation, and an antenna gain of 8.1 ± 0.8 dBi was found over the operating frequencies. The height of the antenna is only 0.169λ (where λ is the free-space wavelength at the center frequency). In addition, the antenna is dc grounded, which satisfies the requirement of many outdoor antennas. © 2013 IEEE.