Wideband Frequency-Reconfigurable Antenna for Airborne Applications

A reconfigurable antenna is proposed for aircraft communication application in the frequency bands of VHF/UHF/L. The aim of this design is to miniaturize the size of antenna to the extent possible and also to enhance its bandwidth. The semi-DGS technique is used to improve the antenna VSWR subsequent to size reduction. The proposed antenna is fabricated on FR4 substrate with dielectric constant 4.4 and thickness of 3.2 mm. One PIN diode is used for reconfiguration capability of antenna. When the PIN-diode is on (ON state), the operating frequency band is 30–230 MHz with gain of 1.5 dBi and when the diode is off (OFF state), the operating frequency band is 420–1560 MHz with the gain of 3 dBi. The VSWR in all the bands is less than two. The measurement results show a good agreement with the simulation results obtained by the fullwave software CST.