Miniaturization of Dielectric Resonator Antenna for
Biomedical communication
Mian Shahzad Iqbal, Karu P. Esselle
Electronic Engineering Department
Macquarie University,
Sydney, NSW2109, Australia
email: shahzad.mian@mq.edu.au
Abstract—A small footprint dielectric resonator antenna (DRA)
for potential use in biomedical communication is presented. The
antenna is designed to operate within the lower European
ultrawideband (UWB) frequency band (3.4-5.0 GHz). The
selected DRA geometry in combination with a lower permittivity
material results in a reduction of antenna size with wide
impedance bandwidth. The bandwidth is enhanced by removal of
air region from the Dielectric resonator (DR) and high dielectric
material is used to make the design more compact. The proposed
DRA with good radiation characteristics offers a simulated
bandwidth of 74% between 3.4 and 7.2 GHz for S11 < -10 dB.
I. INTRODUCTION
Dielectric resonators antennas (DRAs) are attractive due to
their advantages of small size, high radiation efficiency, wide
impedance bandwidth and ease of integration to the system.
Their versatility in shape and the variety of possible feeding
mechanism allow for better control of the results, and research
to broaden its impedance bandwidth. Moreover, growing
demand for multiple high speed wireless applications on the
same small terminal has necessitated the development of
miniaturization of wideband antennas that provide stable
radiation pattern over the entire bandwidth. In recent years,
number of configurations [1-3] has been purposed to design
DRA for FCC ultrawideband (UWB) and lower European
frequency band for body-area network (BAN) and bio-medical
applications.
In this paper, the design concept described in [2] is used
and carried a few step further, resulting in miniaturization of
antenna. A novel dielectric resonator (DR) shape is proposed
here to make the DRA operate within a medical band cover up
to 74% around 5.25 GHz. Two techniques are applied to reduce
the size of antenna and to improve the impedance bandwidth
from 3.4 to 7.2 GHz. With the application of the two
techniques, this DRA has a small size and better impedance
matching within the aforementioned band. Simulated results
are presented to demonstrate the improved performance.
II. ANTENNA DESIGN AND RESULTS
The geometry of the rectangular shape with a sliced tetrahedron
DRA is shown in Figure. 1, the DR with dielectric constant Ԑ2
is placed above a thin dielectric segment of a dielectric constant
Ԑ1. Below the segment is a ground plane. For
978-1-4673-5317-5/13/$31.00 ©2013 IEEE 1904
Yuehe Ge
College of Information Science and Engineering
Huaqiao University
Xiamen, Fujian Province 361021, China
State Key Laboratory of Millimeter Waves
Nanjing 210096, China
t1 t2
l1
Figure 1. Configuration of proposed DRA
a rectangular DRA having a dielectric constant of Ԑr and
dimension l, w and h2 and mounted on a perfect infinite ground
plane, the resonance frequency can be predicted using the
transcendental equation [4].The DR and the dielectric segment
have dimension of l×w×h2 and l×w×h1, respectively. In this
design, the DR will have a higher permittivity than that of the
dielectric segment. The DRA is excited by a coaxial probe.
There is no gap in contact between the DR and the dielectric
segment. Due to the fact that even small pocket of air can have
a significant effect on the resonance frequency of the antenna.
The tetrahedron part removed from the DR have dimension of
t1, t2 and l1 are filled with air. This intentional introduction of
an air region reduces the effective dielectric permittivity of the
DRA which helps to increase the impedance bandwidth. In
addition, stacked arrangement can provide an extremely wide
impedance bandwidth, as investigated in [2].
To reduce the size of the DRA, the image theory is used to
make its length from λ/2 to λ/4[5]. Therefore, highly
conductive metal is applied on one side of wall to make
multiple reflections in dielectric resonator with a specific
electromagnetic distribution. The next method of reducing the
size of a DRA is the use of a very high dielectric constant
material [6] . However, appropriate adjustment between two
different dielectric materials should be necessary to maintain
the propagation of waves from one dielectric material to
another.
The proposed antenna was investigated, simulated and
optimized using ANSOFT HFSS. In our investigation, the
DRA was optimized to obtain a design to cover medical band.
After several optimization tests, the material selected for the
AP-S 2013
DR and the dielectric segment are Ԑ2=18 and Ԑ1=2.94,
respectively. The dielectric segment resides on a ground plane
of dimension 25 mm x 25 mm and is fed through a probe of
diameter 1.3mm. The probe length of 9 mm ensures optimal
impedance match to the 50Ω coaxial cable. Using the tuning
and optimization functions of HFSS, the proposed antenna was
investigated, and finally an UWB DRA design was obtained.
The best matching and bandwidth are obtained when the
following parameters are used: l=6mm, w=6mm, h1=2mm, h2=
12mm, t1=6mm, t2= 4mm and l1=3mm. The surface dimension
of the air gap in the DR is 162.9 mm2. The simulated far field
radiation pattern of the proposed DRA at frequencies of 3.5
GHz, 5.25 GHz and 10 GHz are plotted in Figure 2. It is can be
seen that, in YZ plane, radiation pattern at the three frequencies
have similarities. In addition, there are no significant nulls in Figure 3. Simulated reflection coefficient magnitude of the
the upper hemisphere at any frequency. The simulated proposed DRA.
reflection coefficient magnitude covers the range 3.4 - 7.2 GHz
(74%) for S11 < -10 dB, as shown in Figure 3. In this case, III. CONCLUSION
many wireless systems including medical band are supported.
The total size of the final DRA design is 6×6×14 mm3 or In this paper, a rectangular DRA with tetrahedral-shaped air
0.068λ × 0.068λ × 0.158λ at 3.4 GHz. region reside on lower dielectric segment has been proposed.
It is demonstrated through full-wave electromagnetic simula-
tion that this small footprint antenna has been successfully
operate in the frequency range from 3.4 GHz to 7.2 GHz with
good radiation characteristics. With these features, the
proposed antenna can be used for bio-medical application.
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Figure 2. Simulated Radiation Pattern of proposed
DRA at 3.5GHz, 5.25 GHz and 7 GHz

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