A Low Cost and Portable Microwave Imaging System for Breast Tumor Detection Using UWB Directional Antenna array.

Globally, breast cancer is a major reason for female mortality. Due to the limitations of current clinical imaging, the researchers are encouraged to explore alternative and complementary tools to available techniques to detect the breast tumor in an earlier stage. This article outlines a new, portable, and low-cost microwave imaging (MWI) system using an iterative enhancing technique for breast imaging. A compact side slotted tapered slot antenna is designed for microwave imaging. The radiating fins of tapered slot antenna are modified by etching nine rectangular side slots. The irregular slots on the radiating fins enhance the electrical length as well as produce strong directive radiation due to the suppression of induced surface currents that radiate vertically at the outer edges of the radiating arms with end-fire direction. It has remarkable effects on efficiency and gain. With the addition of slots, the side-lobe levels are reduced, the gain of the main-lobe is increased and corrects the squint effects simultaneously, thus improving the characteristics of the radiation. For experimental validation, a heterogeneous breast phantom was developed that contains dielectric properties identical to real breast tissues with the inclusion of tumors. An alternative PC controlled and microcontroller-based mechanical MWI system is designed and developed to collect the antenna scattering signal. The radiated backscattered signals from the targeted area of the human body are analyzed to reveal the changes in dielectric properties in tissues. The dielectric constants of tumorous cells are higher than that of normal tissues due to their higher water content. The remarkable deviation of the scattered field is processed by using newly proposed Iteratively Corrected Delay and Sum (IC-DAS) algorithm and the reconstruction of the image of the phantom interior is done. The developed UWB (Ultra-Wideband) antenna based MWI has been able to perform the detection of tumorous cells in breast phantom that can pave the way to saving lives.

Circularly polarized S band dual frequency square patch antenna using glass microfiber reinforced PTFE composite.

Circularly polarized (CP) dual frequency cross-shaped slotted patch antenna on 1.575 mm thick glass microfiber reinforced polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) composite material substrate is designed and fabricated for satellite applications. Asymmetric cross-shaped slots are embedded in the middle of the square patch for CP radiation and four hexagonal slots are etched on the four sides of the square patch for desired dual frequency. Different substrate materials have been analysed to achieve the desired operating band. The experimental results show that the impedance bandwidth is approximately 30 MHz (2.16 GHz to 2.19 GHz) for lower band and 40 MHz (3.29 GHz to 3.33 GHz) for higher band with an average peak gain of 6.59 dBiC and 5.52 dBiC, respectively. Several optimizations are performed to obtain the values of the antenna physical parameters. Moreover, the proposed antenna possesses compactness, light weight, simplicity, low cost, and circularly polarized. It is an attractive candidate for dual band satellite antennas where lower band can be used for uplink and upper band can be used for downlink.

Miniaturized dual band multislotted patch antenna on polytetrafluoroethylene glass microfiber reinforced for C/X band applications.

This paper introduces a new configuration of compact, triangular- and diamond-slotted, microstrip-fed, low-profile antenna for C/X band applications on polytetrafluoroethylene glass microfiber reinforced material substrate. The antenna is composed of a rectangular-shaped patch containing eight triangles and two diamond-shaped slots and an elliptical-slotted ground plane. The rectangular-shaped patch is obtained by cutting two diamond slots in the middle of the rectangular patch, six triangular slots on the left and right side of the patch, and two triangular slots on the up and down side of the patch. The slotted radiating patch, the elliptical-slotted ground plane, and the microstrip feed enable the matching bandwidth to be widened. A prototype of the optimized antenna was fabricated on polytetrafluoroethylene glass microfiber reinforced material substrate using LPKF prototyping machine and investigated to validate the proposed design. The simulated results are compared with the measured data, and good agreement is achieved. The proposed antenna offers fractional bandwidths of 13.69% (7.78-8.91 GHz) and 10.35% (9.16-10.19 GHz) where S11 < -10 dB at center frequencies of 8.25 GHz and 9.95 GHz, respectively, and relatively stable gain, good radiation efficiency, and omnidirectional radiation patterns in the matching band.

Inverted S-shaped compact antenna for X-band applications.

A novel probe-fed compact inverted S-shaped multifrequency patch antenna is designed. By employing two rectangular slots that change the conventional rectangular patch into an inverted S-shaped patch, the antenna is able to operate in triple frequency in the X-band. The performance criteria of the proposed design have been experimentally verified by fabricating a printed prototype. The measured results show that the -10 dB impedance bandwidth of the proposed antenna at lower band is 5.02% (8.69-9.14 GHz), at middle band is 9.13% (10.47-11.48 GHz), and at upper band is 3.79% (11.53-11.98 GHz). Two elliptical slots are introduced in the ground plane to increase the peak gain. The antenna is excited by a simple probe feeding mechanism. The overall antenna dimension is 0.52λ × 0.60λ × 0.046λ at a lower resonance frequency of 9.08 GHz. The antenna configuration and parametric investigation are conducted with the help of the high frequency structural simulator, and a good agreement is achieved between the simulated and measured data. The stable gain, omnidirectional radiation pattern, and consistent radiation efficiency in the achieved operating band make the proposed antenna a suitable candidate for X-band applications.

Printed wide-slot antenna design with bandwidth and gain enhancement on low-cost substrate.

This paper presents a printed wide-slot antenna design and prototyping on available low-cost polymer resin composite material fed by a microstrip line with a rotated square slot for bandwidth enhancement and defected ground structure for gain enhancement. An I-shaped microstrip line is used to excite the square slot. The rotated square slot is embedded in the middle of the ground plane, and its diagonal points are implanted in the middle of the strip line and ground plane. To increase the gain, four L-shaped slots are etched in the ground plane. The measured results show that the proposed structure retains a wide impedance bandwidth of 88.07%, which is 20% better than the reference antenna. The average gain is also increased, which is about 4.17 dBi with a stable radiation pattern in the entire operating band. Moreover, radiation efficiency, input impedance, current distribution, axial ratio, and parametric studies of S11 for different design parameters are also investigated using the finite element method-based simulation software HFSS.