Millimeter-Wave EBG-Based Aperture-Coupled Dielectric Resonator Antenna

Design, fabrication and testing of millimeter-wave (MMW) dielectric resonator antenna (DRA) surrounded by electromagnetic band-gap (EBG) structure are presented. For this purpose, MMW mushroom-like, circular patch EBG (CP-EBG) cell is designed and fabricated. The propagation characteristics of the proposed CP-EBG structure are measured using the asymmetric microstrip line method. A cylindrical DRA incorporating the developed CP-EBG structure is then designed and its performance is evaluated with and without the CP-EBG around the 60 GHz bandwidth. Measurements show a significant improvement in the antenna radiation characteristics when it is surrounded by CP-EBG structure. A gain increase of up to 3.2 dBi is obtained while preserving the gain flatness over the suggested bandwidth (
${\pm} 0.7$
dB). An additional backlobe suppression of up to 6.5 dBi is achieved. Moreover, radiation toward substrate edges is significantly reduced.