A conformal pattern adaptive Square Loop Antenna for body and vehicle platforms

A beam steerable Square Loop Antenna (SLA) on a ~λ₀/10 substrate has been designed for conformal platforms. The curving is done on a symmetric spherical surface and its effect on antenna performance is analyzed. The bend limit to which the antenna retains beam adaptive characteristics is reported. The SLA has four feeds and generates a tilted beam which can be steered in space using simple RF switches. Compared to the earlier reported work on non-EBG / non-capacitive fed antenna this SLA effectively is 44 % thinner, has 1.2 dB higher gain and operates at 36.5 % lower frequency.