Quad-band reconfigurable MEMS antenna on silicon substrate for Ku-band applications

This article presents design and EM-Analysis of quad-band frequency reconfigurable antenna for Ku-band applications. Reconfigureability of the antenna is achieved by monolithic integration of MEMS capacitive switches with rectangular microstrip patch antenna yielding four different resonating frequencies. The microwave performance of the antenna is investigated for a 675±20 μm thick high resistive silicon substrate using FEM analysis. The variation of input impedance along longitudinal length of the microstrip patch antenna has also been investigated for the proper impedance matching. For the reconfigurable antenna, a frequency drift of 1.3 GHz ranging from 14.5 to 13.2 GHz with return loss better than -10 dB and high directivity at resonating frequency is achieved.