Recent Advancements in Wearable Antennas and its Future Directions

Wireless communication has played a significant role in transferring data at higher speeds. Due to the compactness of the Antenna in terms of size at high frequency, it is possible to achieve applications in Microwave-millimeter wave bands. The super wideband antenna or multiband antenna can be designed for the Body area network but they need to have conformal characteristics. The microwave frequency bands cover the bandwidth which includes applications such as Global Position Systems(GPS), Bluetooth, ISM band, lower-upper WiMAX and WLAN bands, ultrawideband bandwidth, RADAR, and satellite applications. On the other hand, the ITU has specified FR1 and FR2 bands which include sub 6 GHz band,24 GHz,28 GHz,38GHz,39GHz,60 GHz, and 90 GHz millimeter wave bands. The conformal configuration of the Antenna is useful for body-area networks but with controllable Specific-Absorption-Rate (SAR) with minimal power input. A single antenna covering the above bandwidths either wide or narrow needs to ensure with SAR of less than equal to 1.6 W/kg for wearable applications. The MIMO configuration is really useful for gettinga high data rate and throughput with maximum SAR usinglimited to standard acceptable values and providing high directivity in the boresight direction.