Modifying conventional microwave antenna designs using fine scale structures and nanomaterials

This paper investigates the possibility of designing and fabricating microwave antennas using metallic nanomaterials. Specifically, we will consider modifying the structure of conventional designs including dipoles, loops and apertures. FDTD simulations are used to examine these modified structures. Due to the prohibitive computational requirements of modelling nanoscale objects on a millimetre scale, the structures are approximated using larger scale objects. However, cell sizes down to 2μm have been considered. The results show that the frequency can be decreased. However, typically the bandwidth decreases.