Reconfigurable Bent Two‐Leaf and Four‐Leaf Antennas

This chapter presents two low‐profile antennas that radiate a wide unidirectional beam in the horizontal plane: one antenna is designated as the Bent Two‐Leaf (BeToL) and the other is designated as the Bent Four‐Leaf (BeFoL). These antennas are reconfigurable, that is, the direction of the unidirectional beam can be changed using switching circuits. In addition, an array antenna composed of BeToL elements is investigated to form a fan beam. The analysis in the chapter is performed using the finite‐difference time‐domain method (FDTDM). The chapter presents an antenna that resolves the narrow beam issue and realizes a reconfigurable wide beam. The ground plane for the BeToL is assumed to be of infinite extent. The chapter also discusses the effects of the ground plane size on the antenna characteristics, using BeToL. A reconfigurable antenna that has a high gain is realized by arraying BeToL elements.