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A Compact Universal Antenna System for Automobiles

Abstract Details

2020, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Electrical and Computer Engineering.
With the increasing demands for wireless control, infotainment communication and telematics service, modern cars are equipped with more and more radio frequency (RF) systems such as Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), Satellite Digital Audio Radio Service (SDARS), Cellular, Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X), and Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), for navigation, communication, and entrainment needs. Not only does the number of frequency bands increase, but also the operating frequency goes higher and higher for more bandwidths. However, operating at a higher frequency is accompanied by faster fading issue which can be mitigated via the utilization of diversity reception from multiple antennas with different pattern coverages, polarizations, and spatial locations. However, packing many antennas into a compact low-profile volume as demanded by automobile manufacturers is no easy task because 1) the dimensions of antennas are typically comparable to a quarter to one half of operating wavelengths, and 2) strong coupling and blockage effects occur when other antennas are in proximity (less than a quarter of wavelengths). In addition, the most critical practical requirements of the next generation automobile antennas are low cost, easy installation, low profile, small footprint, covers from 0.7 GHz to 6 GHz, and support up to 4 channels MIMO radios. Unlike the conventional approach of using different antennas for LTE cellular, WLAN, and V2X different systems, Our proposed a compact ultra-wide bandwidth (UWB) universal antenna system reduced the total number of antennas, and thus overall antenna volume, by combing LTE, WLAN, and V2X operations into the same antenna body due to their similarity in pattern coverage and polarization requirements. Note that this is actually very challenging since the antenna needs to work over a very wide bandwidth to support 4G LTE (700 MHz-960 MHz, 1700MHz-2100MHz, 2500MHz-2700MHz, 3400MHz-3700MHz), C-Band of 5G sub6 (3300MHz-5000MHz), WLAN (2400MHz-2500MHz, 5200MHz-5800MHz), and V2X (5800MHz- 5925MHz). Furthermore, four of such wideband antennas need to be packed very closely in order to support 4-channel MIMO or diversity operation within a small overall volume. A separate novel antenna subsystem was also included in the same volume for supporting GNSS L1 (1.559 GHz-1.610 GHz), GNSS L5 (1.164 GHz-1.214 GHz), and SDARS (2.320 GHz-2.345 GHz) since they are on a different system. Compared with the conventional antenna design approach, the proposed antenna system decreases the total antenna number from 14 to 5 as well as reduce the height by 70%. In this dissertation, a novel compact universal vehicle antenna system is presented, which includes a 4-channel LTE/WLAN/V2X antenna and an integrated GNSS/SDARS antenna covers the 700MHz to 6GHz within a volume of 6 inches in diameter (0.355𝜆 at 700MHz) and 0.86 inches in height (0.05𝜆 at 700MHz). The 4- channel LTE/WLAN/V2X antenna offers four vertically polarized diversity patterns in azimuth plane for LTE/WLAN/V2X. When all four LTE/WLAN/V2X antenna elements are operating together in phase they produce a uniform azimuth pattern coverage for supporting the “common mode” operation, which is commonly used as a reference measurement. The integrated GNSS/SDARS antenna offers right-hand circular polarization (RHCP) upper hemisphere pattern coverage for GNSS, and left-hand circular polarization (LHCP) upper hemisphere pattern coverage for SDARS. The results validated the design which was developed and optimized using commercial full-wave electromagnetic simulation software (HFSS). The electromagnetic compatibility between compact 4-channel LTE/WLAN/V2X antenna and the integrated GNSS/SDARS antenna is studied. The performance of the complete compact universal antenna system is presented. Two prototype antennas were fabricated and measured.
Chi-Chih Chen (Advisor)
Nima Ghalichechian (Committee Member)
Fernando Teixeira (Committee Member)
C.K. Shum (Committee Member)
200 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Che, J. (2020). A Compact Universal Antenna System for Automobiles [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1577704073918621

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Che, Jiukun. A Compact Universal Antenna System for Automobiles. 2020. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1577704073918621.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Che, Jiukun. "A Compact Universal Antenna System for Automobiles." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2020. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1577704073918621

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)