A Compact Smart Antenna for WiMAX Radio

In this paper, we present our design and development of a compact, light weight, high gain smart antenna for WiMAX radio systems. The antenna head is an 8-monopole uniform circular array placed on a ground plane with ground skirt. The operation frequency is 5.8 GHz. The array is connected to an 8-channel beamforming board via low-loss coax. The 8-channel signal combines through a power splitter/combiner which directs the signal to/from the WiMAX radio. An FPGA chip is on board to control the digital phase shifters, attenuators and switches for T/R synchronization, signal searching, beamforming, and tracking. The test results show that the smart antenna is capable of tracking mobile targets, communicating directionally with desired users, suppressing interference and jamming, and enabling a long range with high throughput and reliable connection.