Planar Ultrawideband Antenna with Photonically Controlled Notched Bands

Abstract EN

A design of a planar microstrip-fed ultrawideband (UWB) printed circular monopole antenna with optically controlled notched bands is presented.

The proposed antenna is composed of a circular ultrawideband patch, with an etched T-shaped slot controlled by an integrated silicon switch.

The slot modifies the frequency response of the antenna suppressing 3.5–5 GHz band when the switch is in open state.

The optical switch is controlled by a low-power near-infrared (808 nm) laser diode, which causes the change in the frequency response of the antenna generating a frequency notch.

This solution could be expanded to include several notches in the antenna frequency response achieving a fully reconfigurable UWB antenna.

The antenna could be remotely controlled at large distances using optical fiber.

The prototype antenna has been fully characterized to verify these design concepts.