Wide-Scan MSC-AFTSA Array-Fed Grooved Spherical Lens Antenna for Millimeter-Wave MIMO Applications

A new three-element multi-sin-shape corrugated antipodal Fermi tapered slot antenna (MSC-AFTSA) array integrated with a grooved spherical (GS) lens operating at 57-64 GHz is introduced. Multicorrugated patterns are implemented to obtain better matching performance when the antenna feeds the GS lens with broadband coverage. An implemented design for grooving the lens profile presents a new principle to obtain an optimum focal point feed using the tapered slot antennas. This technique gives more freedom to enhance the E- and H-plane characteristics with a gain of 20 dB, radiation efficiency of 83% at 60 GHz, and wide angle multibeam coverage. It is a relatively small spherical-lens antenna with three feeds of MSC-AFTSA array, 44.2 x 51.6 x 25.4 mm(3) in size. There is a good agreement between calculated and measured results. The proposed antenna prototype with its wide-scan performance is suitable for broadband multiple-input-multiple-output communication systems operating at millimeter-wave bands.