A U-shaped inverted F microstrip patch antenna for portable terminals

The intrinsic disadvantages of patch antennas such as narrow bandwidth and nonuniform coverage are the reasons why this class of antenna has not been seriously considered for hand-held application. In this paper we present a new design for a U-shaped patch antenna that has a reasonable bandwidth, adequate coverage, and less interaction with the head and the hand of the user. Based on our earlier investigations (Manteghi 1997; and Manteghi et al. 1996) the important goals of the research reported here, were to obtain the maximum coverage and to properly correct the near-field pattern so that the undesired interactions with the user's head and hand are minimized.