A Capacitive Coupled Patch Antenna Array With High Gain and Wide Coverage for 5G Smartphone Applications

In this paper, a novel capacitive coupled patch antenna array capable of providing high gain and 360° coverage in the elevation plane is proposed. The proposed antenna element is studied in detail using the theory of characteristic modes to enhance the bandwidth. It exhibits a uniform radiation pattern with a stable gain when integrated with the mobile phone chassis. These elements are positioned in the mobile phone chassis as a set of four sub-arrays each with 12 antenna elements to provide high realized gain around 16.5 dBi with each sub-array providing 90° coverage. The antenna array is fabricated, and the beam steering performance of the array is evaluated using a beam-steering test bed. The results show that it covers the frequency range of 24-28 GHz, which is a promising band for future 5G-based smartphone services as predicted and could be a strong candidate for 5G applications.