Dual-Band Metamaterial Based on Jerusalem Cross Structure With Interdigital Technique for LTE and WLAN Systems

This paper presents a novel metamaterial based on Jerusalem cross structure with interdigital technique to be applied for dual-band systems. The proposed structure can operate at resonant frequencies of 1.8 and 5.5 GHz for LTE and WLAN bands, respectively. The interdigital structure was added to connect at the end of the Jerusalem cross structure in order to control the resonant frequencies and to promote for permittivity adjustment. The proposed metamaterial unit cell was designed to achieve the simulated dual-band operation with bandwidths of 1.70 ~ 1.95 GHz at 1.8 GHz and 5.06 ~ 6.04 GHz at 5.5 GHz, respectively. The unit cell size is reduced from λ/2 to λ/4 which is much smaller than the conventional structure. The 5×5 unit cells of metamaterials were implemented as a reflector for a dipole antenna resulting in dual-band operation with bandwidths of 1.58 ~ 1.88 GHz at 1.8 band and 5.05 ~ 5.68 GHz at 5.5 band, respectively. Besides, the dipole antenna with the proposed metamaterial reflector has measured gains up to 8.23 dBi at 1.8 GHz and 8.30 dBi at 5.5 GHz, respectively. Moreover, the shape of metamaterial structure is symmetrical, so it can be used for dual linear polarization. Also, the antenna with the proposed reflector has low profile with the distance of λ/8 between radiator and reflector. Therefore, the proposed metamaterial can be applied for any antenna applicable for LTE and WLAN applications.