A planar leaky wave antenna operating in two frequency bands

The investigation and design of a leaky wave antenna is presented in this paper. The antenna has a planar structure composed of a substrate integrated waveguide. This waveguide is designed as a composite right/left-handed transmission line operating in two balanced frequency bands spanned from approx. 8.6 up to 9.5 GHz and from 15 up to 19 GHz with closed gaps between the left- and right-handed regions. The novelty of the structure lies in its dual band operation and the applied SIW technology. An effective way of determining the complex dispersion characteristics of the antenna is presented, and an equivalent circuit of a line unit cell is derived. The antenna was fabricated and the measured characteristics are in good agreement with those predicted by the simulation. The advantage of the antenna lies in its planar structure, which is suitable for cheap mass production.