Frequency and Polarization Reconfigurable Microfluidic Antenna

A frequency and polarization reconfigurable microfluidic antenna is proposed in this article, where the reconfiguration is achieved by the microfluidic driving technology and liquid metal. The antenna has two reconfigurable frequency bands, and each frequency band can achieve both linear and circular polarization reconfiguration. It can be also made into a reconfigurable flexible antenna. Therefore, it is highly adaptable. The antenna overcomes the disadvantages of common semiconductor reconfigurable antennas, such as nonlinear distortion, short lifespan and no support for high power operation. A prototype antenna is fabricated and measured. The experimental results are in good agreement with the simulation results. The research results demonstrate that the antenna has a wide working bandwidth over general reconfigurable antennas and excellent polarization performance. Meanwhile, it exhibits low loss and stable performance. The measured -10 dB impedance bandwidths of the four reconfigurable modes are 20.53% (4.37 GHz~5.37 GHz), 38.69% (3.94 GHz~5.83 GHz), 33.37% (6.99 GHz~9.79 GHz), and 49.65% (5.92 GHz~9.83 GHz), respectively. The 3 dB axial ratio bandwidths of the two circular polarizations are respectively 0.89 GHz and 0.91 GHz.