An UWB Compact Microstrip Antenna for S Band,
C Band and X Band Applications
Tapesh Bhandari
EEE&I, BITS PILANI
K K Birla Goa Campus
Goa, India
Email: tapesh.bhandari@gmail.com
Abstract— This paper is aimed at developing an Ultra-
Wide band antenna for S Band, C Band and X Band
Applications. This is designed using FR-4 (Lossy) substrate
with 1.5 mm substrate thickness and the results of the
simulations are validated using CST MWS 2011. The
proposed design is achieved in 3 steps with each step
resulting in a huge enhancement in the bandwidth. The
proposed antenna works for all frequencies from 2.82-12.39
GHz resulting in a huge bandwidth of 9.57 GHz. Bandwidth
enhancement of 56.62 percent is observed in the proposed
antenna as compared to a simple patch antenna, presented
in Step 1 of the following work. The proposed antenna
provides this huge bandwidth with a nominal size of 15×20
mm2. The results are evident that the proposed antenna can
be used for some part of the S Band (2-4 GHz), whole of C
Band (4-8 GHz) and X Band (8-12 GHz) and will work for
many applications including 802.11a Wi-Fi, Military and
Government Institutions and Air Traffic Control.
Keywords— Ultra Wide Band, Return loss, Voltage
Standing Wave Ratio, Microstrip Patch Antenna, Compact
Antenna.
I. INTRODUCTION
Due to the cost effectiveness, flexibility, convenience and
constant connectivity, Wireless Communication Systems is a
rapidly growing topic in today’s research work and every
wireless communication system is incomplete without an
antenna. Antennas are used to convert electrical power into
radio waves and vice-versa [1]. The most popular kind of
antenna is Microstrip Antenna. They are very light in weight,
cheap and easy to manufacture.
There are many types of Microstrip antennas including
Fractal antennas, Reconfigurable Antennas, Array antennas etc.
The most popular of them being Wideband antennas. These
antennas have a very large bandwidth and hence they can be
used for multiple applications without modifying the design.
Researchers around the world aims to achieve this Ultra-wide
bandwidth with the size of the antenna being as compact as
possible.
Partial Ground plane is a common technique through which
Ultra-wide bandwidth is achieved. In ref. [2], this technique is
used along with slotting and hexagonal patch to provide a huge
Sudeep Baudha
EEE&I, BITS PILANI
K K Birla Goa campus
Goa India
Email: sudeepb@goa.bits-pilani.ac.in
bandwidth. Parasitic elements in the patch is a common
technique which is used to adjust the operational frequency of
the antenna by a fine amount. In this technique some part of the
antenna is not connected electrically and is fed back to the
lumped port. In ref. [3], this technique is used, along with U-
shaped slit in the ground plane, to further enhance the
bandwidth of the antenna. Furthermore, Slotting and notching
are some other techniques by which the operational frequencies
of the antenna can be decreased and the Bandwidth can be
increased. In this technique, a part of the ground plane is
removed so as to create resonance with the Patch. In ref. [4],
diamond shaped structure is placed on the top of the square slot
and hence ultra-wide band is achieved. In ref. [5], a semi-
elliptical slot is made in the conventional rectangular patch so
as to create resonance in the upper band of frequencies. In ref.
[6], tilting the patch and notching in the ground plane has made
it possible to widen the bandwidth of the proposed antenna. In
ref. [7], the effects of adding the parasitic elements has been
illustrated. In ref. [8], Dual-band behavior is observed and
analyzed by using a number of T and C shaped slots. The using
of H-shaped slots and parameterizing the vertical length of the
slots, to achieve impedance matching at lower as well as higher
frequencies, is seen and observed in ref. [9]. In ref. [10], the
bandwidth enhancement is done using horizontal gaps in the
patch of the proposed antenna.
In this paper, an UWB Antenna is proposed which has a
partial ground plane, parasitic slots in the patch with two
unsymmetrical slots in the ground plane. This work is achieved
using three steps the details of which are specified in the
following work. Parametric analysis was done on the
dimensions of the antenna and the dimensions of the slots and
feed and the design with maximum bandwidth is proposed in
the paper. The final antenna is found to be working for all
frequencies from 2.82 to 12.39 GHz. The size of the antenna is
15×20 mm2 which is 28.57% smaller in size as compared to the
one proposed in ref. [3].The proposed antenna can be used for
many applications including radar communications, 802.11a
Wi-Fi, Satellite Communications, military and government
institutions and Weather Monitoring.
II. METHODOLOGY
In this work, a Microstrip parasitic patch antenna with
partial and slotted ground plane is proposed and analyzed.
This antenna was designed using FR-4 Lossy substrate. Table
1 shows the properties of the substrate.
 Table 1. Properties of the substrate
Property Name Value

Relative Permittivity, εr 4.3

Thickness/Height of Substrate 1.5 mm

A. Antenna Design
The design of the antenna is made in 3 steps which is shown
in Fig. 1. Firstly, a conventional rectangular patch antenna
is designed with partial ground plane Fig. 1(a). In the second
step, the parasitic elements in the patch of the antenna are (c)
introduced as shown in Fig. 1(b). In the third step, the
proposed antenna is shown wherein two square notches are Figure 1. (a) Step 1 (b) Step 2 (c) Step 3 or Proposed
removed from the already partial ground plane as shown in Antenna
Fig. 1(c). Table 2 shows the values of the different The following equations [1] are used to calculate dimensions
parameters which are used in Fig. 1. and resonant frequency of a conventional microstrip patch
Table 2: Proposed antenna Design parameters (All values antenna:
are in mm) (1) Effective dielectric constant for Er=4.3
Parameter Name Value ፴௥ାଵ ፴௥ିଵ
షభ
௧௛௜௖௞௡௘௦௦ మ
፴௥௘௙௙ ൌ ൅ ቂͳ ൅ ͳʹ ቃ
a 15 ଶ ଶ ௐ௜ௗ௧௛
Where ‘thickness’ is thickness of substrate and ‘width’ is width
b 20 of patch antenna. Due to fringing effective length is more than
physical length. The effective length is Leff
c 10
‫ܮ‬௘௙௙ ൌ ‫ ܮ‬൅ ʹο‫ܮ‬
h 1.5
f 10.25 While 'L is given by

s 1 ‫݄ݐ݀݅ݓ‬
ο‫ܮ‬ ൫‫א‬௥௘௙௙ ൅ ͲǤ͵൯ ቀ ൅ ͲǤʹ͸Ͷቁ
‫ݏݏ݄݁݊݇ܿ݅ݐ‬
p 4.7 ൌ ͲǤͶͳʹ
݄ ‫݄ݐ݀݅ݓ‬
൫‫א‬௥௘௙௙ െ ͲǤʹͷͺ൯ ቀ ൅ ͲǤͺቁ
g 5.8 ‫ݏݏ݄݁݊݇ܿ݅ݐ‬
z 4 The actual length L can be calculated using following formula
wf 3 ͳ
‫ܮ‬ൌ െ ʹο‫ܮ‬
ʹ݂௥ ඥ‫א‬௥௘௙௙ Ɋ௢ ‫א‬௢
i 3
j 2 ௖ ଶ
Width W is given by ܹ ൌ ට‫א‬ , where c is speed of light
ଶ௙ ೝ ାଵ
and f is frequency.

III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

A. Analysis with respect to the Alterations in the Design
The following Fig. 2 shows the Return loss Plot comparison
of the designs in Step 1, Step 2 and Step 3 which are represented
by Antenna 1, Antenna 2 and Antenna 3 respectively. From the
graph we infer that Antenna 1 has an operating region from 4.22
(a) (b) to 10.33 GHz. However, as we make parasitic patches in
Antenna 2, we see that it has an operating region from 2.91 to
4.50 GHz and then from 5.18 to 10.71 GHz. Furthermore, if we
make two notches in the ground plane along with the partial
ground, the proposed Antenna 3 shows a great enhancement in
Bandwidth and it has an operating region from 2.82 to 12.39
GHz.
 Figure 3. Parametric Analysis with respect to the
length of the feedline

Figure 2. Comparative Return loss plot for Step 1,
Step 2 and Step 3
The following Table 3 compares and compiles the results
for the analysis of alteration in design. We observe that there is
an increment of 56.62% in the bandwidth in the proposed
antenna as compared to Step 1.
Table 3. Tabular Comparison of Step 1, Step 2 and
Step 3
Fig. 4 shows the parametric analysis of the antenna with
respect to the length of the ground plane (‘g’ in Fig.1). From the
figure it is evident that the length of the ground plane is one of
the major reason for the bandwidth enhancement. For g = 7.8,
Impedance matching is observed for a long range but the
operational frequency band is not large. For all values of g other
than 5.8, we see that the Bandwidth of the antenna gets limited
to a value lesser than 12.39 GHz hence it is chosen for the
proposed antenna.

Step 1 Step 2 Step 3

Operating 4.22-10.33 2.91-4.50, 2.82-12.39
Frequency(GHz)
5.18-10.71
Bandwidth(GHz) 6.11 7.12 9.57

B. Parameter Sweep
The analysis of a particular design variable with respect to
its current value is known as Parameter Sweep. The parameter
sweep helps us find the most optimum value of any variable so
as to get the best results without changing the entire design.
Fig.3 shows the parametric analysis of the antenna with
respect to the length of the feedline (‘f’ in Fig. 1). We see that Figure 4. Parametric analysis with respect to the length
as length of the feedline increases, the impedance matching is of the partial ground plane
observed around 9 GHz. Also, with increase in f, impedance Fig. 5 shows the parametric analysis of the antenna with
matching is also observed at 4.25 GHz. From the figure we infer respect to the dimension of the mid square notch in the ground
that the results are the most optimum for f = 10.25(Green) plane (p in Fig. 1). From the figure we infer that only for p=4.7,
which provides the largest band of frequencies. does the antenna has a single band of 9.57 GHz, in all the other
cases Dual Band or triple band is observed and hence the
purpose of Ultra-Wide Band cannot be achieved for p≠4.7.
 Ͷߎ‫ ݂ܣ‬ଶ
‫ ܦ‬ൌ
ܿଶ
We observe that D is proportional to the square of frequency
and hence D increases with increase in frequency and so does
the gain which can be observed in Fig. 7.
Since the electrical size of the antenna is large at higher
frequencies, therefore enhancement of the directional properties
of the antenna is observed. Hence, initially the radiation
efficiency of the antenna increases with respect to the frequency
but as the frequency goes on increasing, the dielectric losses of
the antenna increases which is inversely proportional to the
radiation efficiency. Hence the radiation efficiency starts to
decrease after 8 GHz.
Figure 5. Parametric analysis with respect to the side of
the mid notched square in the ground plane
Fig. 6 shows the parametric analysis of the antenna with
respect to the length of the parasitic elements in the patch. From
the graph, we see that only for s=0.5 and s=1 do we have a
single band but for s=1, the bandwidth on the upper side is
higher which is not observed for s=0.5 Hence, s=1(red) is the
most optimum selection for this antenna.

Figure 7. Gain and Radiation Efficiency v/s Frequency

Curve
D. Impedance Plot
The following Fig. 8 shows the impedance plot of the
antenna. The black line in the figure represents the real part of
the impedance and the red line represents the imaginary part.
The real part of the antenna lies mostly in the region of 20Ω to
45Ω. The imaginary part of the antenna is mostly below zero
and hence negative which suggests that the antenna has a
capacitive effect. We infer, from the figure, that the antenna is
well matched to the standard impedance of 50Ω.

Figure 6. Parametric Analysis of the antenna with

respect to the length of the parasitic elements
C. Radiation Efficiency and Gain v/s Frequency
The following Fig. 7 shows the graph for Gain and
Radiation Efficiency with respect to the corresponding
frequencies. The black curve represents the Radiation
Efficiency and the red curve represents the gain of the antenna
in dB. The antenna shows maximum radiation of 71.10% at the
frequency of 8 GHz. The following equations helps us
understand this behavior of the proposed antenna.
Figure 8. Impedance Plot of the Antenna
Gain = ηD
E. Surface Current Distribution
Where η is the efficiency and D is the directivity of the
The following Fig. 9 shows the Surface Current Distribution
antenna.
of the Antenna. The distribution is shown for four frequencies
Ͷߎ‫ܣ‬ namely 5 GHz, 7 GHz, 9 GHz and 11 GHz. The figures have an
‫ ܦ‬ൌ adjoining current density meter, which shows the intensity of
ߣଶ
the current density based on the colour coding used in the
Where A is the Aperture area and λ is the wavelength. We figure. We see that the number of modes increases with increase
know that λ = c/f, where c is the speed of light and f is the
frequency and hence the above equation can be modified to:
in frequency from (a) to (d). The consistency of the S11 plot
can also be verified with the surface current distribution.
Figure 9. Surface Current Distribution for (a) 5 GHz
(b) 7 GHz (c) 9 GHz (d) 11 GHz
E. Radiation Pattern Plots
The following Fig. 10 shows the Radiation Pattern plots of
the Antenna. The red line in the figure represents the E-Plane
corresponding to Phi = 900 and the black line represents the H-
Plane corresponding to Phi = 0 0. The figure is plotted for the
four frequencies, similar to the Surface Current Distribution,
namely 5 GHz, 7 GHz, 9 GHz and 11 GHz. We see that all the
radiation patterns imply that the proposed antenna provides a
stable radiation pattern with radiating almost equally in all the
directions. Without the loss of generality we can interpolate this
result in the entire operational band of the antenna and we infer
that the antenna provides stable radiation pattern at all
frequencies within its operation band.
Figure 10. Radiation Pattern plots for (a) f=5 GHz (b)
f=7 GHz (c) f=9 GHz (d) f=11 GHz
IV. CONCLUSION
The proposed antenna has a total size of 15*20*1.5 mm3 which
is a very compact antenna that too with a very simple
configuration. The purpose of the antenna was to provide Ultra-
wide Bandwidth which it achieves sufficiently. The impedance
requirements of the antenna is also met and nice impedance
matching is observed. The antenna also provides good and
stable radiation pattern making the antenna radiate almost
equally in all directions. The gain and the radiation efficiency
of the antenna is also found to be satisfactory and increasing
with increase in frequency. Due to these reasons, the proposed
antenna can be used for all applications of S Band(2-4 GHz), C
Band(4-8 GHz) and X Band(8-12 GHz) applications including
Satellite Communications, Wi-Fi (3.5/5.5 GHz), Microwave
Oven, Cordless phones, Weather Monitoring, Military
Communications and Radar Applications.
VI. REFERENCES
[1] C.A. Balanis, “Antenna Theory – Analysis and
Design”, 2nd Edition, John Wiley.
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broadband printed monopole antenna with U-shaped
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