1st Int’l Conf.

on Recent Advances in Information Technology | RAIT-2012 |

Microstrip Loop Antenna for Wearable

Applications
Sakshi Kumari, Vibha Rani Gupta, Adarsh Agarwal, Abhishek Kumar, Ankit Raj
Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering
Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra
Ranchi, Jharkhand, India
sakshi501@gmail.com , vrgupta@bitmesra.ac.in

Abstract:This paper presents a microstrip rectangular loop [5-6]. But all these antennas are proposed on fabrics as a
antenna for wearable application. The substrate used for the substrate and the performance of wearable textile antennas
prototype model is a FR4 material. The designed antenna can is affected on the antenna bending [7]. In the present paper,
be integrated with a watch and is suitable for the wearable a microstrip patch antenna is proposed which can be
application. The characteristics of the prototype antenna
integrated with watch thus provides wearing comforts at the
developed, are measured in terms of the return loss, VSWR
bandwidth, and radiation pattern. It is found that the same time avoids any bending.
fabricated antennas possess 210 MHz VSWR Bandwidth. This
II. MICROSTRIP ANTENNA (MSA) DESIGN
antenna can be placed over the outer ring a rectangular watch
without disturbing the wearing comfort. Microstrip loop antennas are the most inexpensive and
very versatile antenna that can take many different forms
Keywords:Wearable antenna; watch antenna; Microstrip such as a rectangle, square, triangle, ellipse, circle, and
antenna; Patch antenna.
many other configurations. They are classified as
electrically small, if the circumference C is smaller than
I. INTRODUCTION
one-tenth of the wavelength (C < 0.1λ), and electrically
Personal Communication technology has resulted in large if it is comparable to one wave-length (C » λ ). Loop
growing demand for the antennas for wearable antennas are normally used in applications operating at
applications. The continuous healthcare and assistance
frequencies up to 3GHz. Small loop antennas are the most
during daily life necessitates an unobtrusive embedding of
efficient antennas for small human worn equipment such as
sensors and electronics in our outfit without affecting
pagers, RF tags, and controllers, since the low conductivity
wearing comfort. Further, patients would benefit most
when he is in contact with the monitoring devices and of human body will not degrade the antenna.
health condition can be communicated to a medical center. As we have a small radiation range in the body sensor
The importance of the wearable antennas is also justified in networks, and the loop antenna is less affected by the
maintaining communications on the battlefield human body, so the loop antenna is still a preferred choice
environment. Radio operators are easily identified by their for the on-the-body sensors. Because of the simplicity in
protruding antennas that often get caught in terrain analysis, construction and application for wearable
elements are the prime targets. In addition, the antennas application, the rectangular loop has been chosen which has
limit the mobility and are easily broken by trees and received the widest attention in terms of conformability.
bushes. A body worn, visually covert antenna is being The configuration of the proposed rectangular microstrip
loop antenna has been shown in Fig.1 while the simulated
proposed to address these operational issues.
antenna design using HFSS software has been shown in Fig.
Considering the various issues like requirement of
2. In order to design this antenna, the circumference of
small lightweight flat planar structure that can be
rectangular loop should be around one free space
comfortably worn, together with requirement of limited
wavelength (λ = 125 mm at 2.45 GHz) [8]. The design
radiated power in the direction of the wearer to minimize specifications for rectangular watch antenna have been
the radiation problem, microstrip antennas are found to be listed below:
the good candidate.
Length : 52 mm
Earlier wearable antennas presented in [1-3] were
Breadth : 42 mm
designed as simple rectangular patches with linear
Copper Width: 2 mm
polarization. A circularly polarized textile antenna with

Material used: FR4
microstrip feed is presented in [4] ensuring wearing

Dielectric constant: 4.4
comfort. A wide bandwidth antenna has been presented in

Substrate height: 1.6 mm

978-1-4577-0697-4/12/$26.00 ©2012 IEEE

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 1st Int’l Conf. on Recent Advances in Information Technology | RAIT-2012 |

Operating Frequency: 2.45 GHz

Bandwidth : 240 MHz

1 mm

42 mm
2 mm

52mm Figure 3. Measured Return Loss of Microstrip Rectangular Loop

mm Antenna
Figure 1 Microstrip Loop Antenna Design

Figure 2. Simulated Antenna Design

Figure 4. 2D E and H plane Radiation Pattern at 2.45 GHz

IV. CONCLUSIONS
III. RESULT AND DISCUSSIONS In this paper, the microstrip rectangular ring antenna is
The fundamental aim for this is to develop a microstrip investigated for wearable applications. This antenna can be
patch wearable antenna which can cover the ISM band for placed over the outer ring a rectangular watch without
the Bluetooth application. The designed antenna was disturbing the wearing comfort. Taking into account all
fabricated and its characteristics were measured. Fig.3 practical requirements (small size and compactness), one can
shows the measured return loss characteristics and is in say that this antenna is a good candidate for wearable radio
good agreement with the simulated result. The measured systems with wider desired bandwidth.
minimum return loss is -43 dB and the measured VSWR ACKNOWLEDGMENT
bandwidth is 210 MHz. which is sufficiently high to cover
the entire range of the Bluetooth applications. The authors acknowledge the financial support granted
Fig. 4 shows the simulated radiation pattern in E and H under Research Promotion Scheme (RPS), All India
plane. The E plane pattern is more directive compared to the Council For Technical Education, Indira Gandhi Sports
H Plane. The gain of the antenna is in negative and needs to Complex, IP Estate, New Delhi –110 002.
be improved.

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