ENEE 789A: Antennas for Wireless Personal Communication Systems

Course Goals:

Develop the knowledge of the sources and radiation of electromagnetic fields necessary to design antennas for application to personal communication systems. The impedance, bandwidth and radiation characteristics of dipole, loop, helical and strip line antennas will be analyzed in detail in view of specific applications to personal, mobile and base station communication technology. The influence of the human body on the radiation performance will be discussed in detail for personal communication antennas.

Course Prerequisite(s):

ENEE 381 or equivalent

Topics Prerequisite(s):

Textbook(s)

Reference(s):

Q. Balzano, Field Theory of Basic Antennas, Motorola University (1999)
R.F. Harrington, Time-Harmonic Electromagnetic Fields, McGraw-Hill (2001)
K. Fujimoto and J.R. James(ed),Mobile Antenna System Handbook, 2nd Ed., Artech House (2001).

Core Topics:

  • Course overview, review of Maxwell’s equations, vector potentials and Green’s function for free space, wave analysis, TE, TM and TEM waves (1 week).
  • Properties of radiated fields, boundary conditions, fields near tips and edges, reflection of waves at planar boundaries, images of RF sources. Review of the Fourier Transform and its application to field equations (1 week).
  • Integral equations, linear approximation in Hilbert spaces, Galerkin’s method (1 week).
  • Theory of dipole antennas, antenna current and impedance, monopole over a ground plane, baluns and dipole feed design, antenna bandwidth and application to portable and mobile communication systems (2 weeks)
  • Theory of omnidirectional helical antennas, antenna current and impedance, antenna quality factor and bandwidth, helices over a ground plane, applications of helical antennas to portable and mobile communication systems (2 weeks)
  • Theory of loop antennas, antenna current and impedance vs. loop diameter, loop as a dipole antenna and as a small receive antenna, application of the loop antenna (2 weeks).
  • Theory of strip line antennas, antenna current, bandwidth and feeds for strip line antennas, gamma match, PIFA and application of strip line antennas to communication technology (2 weeks)
  • The far field of antennas, asymptotic evaluation of electromagnetic fields, transmit and receive properties of antennas, directivity, gain and equivalent area (1week)
  • Arrays of antennas, antennas in complex environments, antennas with reflectors, design criteria for mobile and portable antennas (1 week)

Optional Topics:

  • Aperture antennas and arrays of aperture antennas
  • Far field of aperture antennas
  • Horn antennas with parabolic reflectors
  • The near field of antennas, geometry and intensity.

Course Structure: Lecture based course

Grading Method:

  • 50% Final
  • 30% Midterm
  • 20% Class and homework
| Dept. of Electrical & Computer Engineering | A. James Clark School of Engineering | University of Maryland |