A Novel Planar Slot Array Antenna With Omnidirectional Pattern

A novel planar slot array antenna with omnidirectional radiation pattern in the horizontal plane is proposed. The antenna has a simple structure based on a stripline. Its fabrication employs a low-cost and accurate planar printed technique. A series of rectangular-shaped loop slots are etched on two parallel ground planes, and act as radiators. The basic principle of operation of the antenna is discussed in this study. An antenna with eight back-to-back slots is designed by employing the genetic algorithm (GA) implemented on a cluster system to achieve good omnidirectional radiation characteristics. A prototype antenna is fabricated and measured. The measurement results agree with the simulation data and show that this antenna possesses encouraging features. For example, at the working frequency of 5.8 GHz, it has a well-formed omnidirectional pattern with maximum gain variation less than 0.5 dB in the horizontal plane, a high gain level of 10 dBi, side lobes 10 dB below the main lobe and no beam squint. Meanwhile, this antenna achieves an impedance bandwidth of 4.6% of the center frequency (5.68-5.95 GHz) for S(11) < -10 dB and exhibits stable omnidirectional performance over the impedance bandwidth.