Impedance matching and implementation of planar space-filling dipoles as intraocular implanted antennas in a retinal prosthesis

In this work, an extremely compact planar meander line dipole is designed and implemented for use as an intraocular element in a retinal prosthesis. This planar meander dipole antenna exhibits a high degree of current vector alignment and is impedance matched by inducing a current phase reversal along its length. This current phase reversal is induced by a minor offset in feed location which yields a highly directive broadside radiation pattern on this particular planar antenna geometry. This concept is applied in designing and implementing a 6/spl times/6 mm planar compact wire dipole at 1.4 GHz as the intraocular element for the data telemetry link of a retinal prosthesis. Coupling measurements between an external microstrip patch antenna and the intraocular wire dipole are presented and compared with those obtained with intraocular microstrip patch antennas in place of the wire dipole. It is demonstrated that such compact meander dipoles can perform better than previously reported microstrip patch antennas as intraocular elements for a retinal prosthesis.