Integration of Aperture-Coupled Multipoint Feed Patch Antenna With Solar Cells Operating at Dual Compressed High-Order Modes

This letter presents an aperture-coupled multipoint feed patch antenna integrated with solar cells capable of powering to low-power wireless sensors. Meanwhile, the solar cells as part of radiators are located at the top of the structure, improving design integration. Multipoint feed structure is employed for wideband performance. To verify the proposed solar cell antenna radiation performance and optical energy harvesting abilities, a prototype aperture-coupled multipoint feed solar cell antenna is fabricated and measured. The simulation and measurement results agree well with each other, thus, demonstrating that its total size of only 1.31 λ₀ × 1.31 λ₀ × 0.06 λ₀ (λ₀ is the free-space wavelength at the center frequency) and the antenna has achieved a stable gain varied from 9.47 to 10.85 dBi over the operating band of 4.8-5 GHz of 5G communication.