A Wideband Low Cost and Optically Transparent Water Patch Antenna with Omnidirectional Conical Beam Radiation Patterns

A novel kind of optically transparent, low cost and wideband water patch antenna is demonstrated and analyzed. A significant feature of the proposed linearly polarized antenna is that both the patch and the ground plane are made of water. Thus, the whole structure becomes optically transparent except the small central feeding probe. The main radiators are made of water, which is available everywhere, low in cost and easy to be fabricated compared with other transparent materials. Results show that a wide impedance bandwidth of 35% for |S₁₁| < −10 dB, a gain up to 4 dBi and symmetric omnidirectional conical beam radiation patterns with small crosspolarizations can be obtained. Due to the low cost and remarkable radiation performances, this novel transparent patch antenna is believed to have many promising applications in the future transparent electronics designs and flexible electronics.