Ultra-Wideband Vivaldi Antennas Designed on an Economical Substrate for 5G Base Stations

in this article, an ultra-wideband traveling wave antenna with antipodal topology is proposed. The proposed design is realized on an economical substrate with minimum thickness. The proposed design offers an ultra-wide bandwidth of 26 to 40 GHz, translating to 42%. The dimensions of the antenna are 20mm x10mm x 0.5mm indicating an electrically compact structure. The proposed antenna offers high front to back ratio of at least 10dB across the bandwidth of operation. The forward gain of the antenna varies from 4 to 7dBi in the afore-mentioned band. The pattern integrity is maintained throughout the band. The antenna is fabricated using the commercial photolithography process. A mutli-step topology of the antennas is also proposed for wide angular coverage. The coverage is greater than 150º with mutual coupling less than 25dB. These performance metrics is achieved with a very small footprint. Simulated and experimental results are presented in this paper.