A Broadband and Wide-Angle Scanning Planar Phased Array Antenna for Sub-6 GHz Applications

This manuscript presents a two-dimensional (2-D) broadband and wide-angle scanning phased array antenna with a combined superstrate. The dipole array antenna incorporates arching metal columns that suppress mutual coupling, hence achieving wideband matching and broad beamwidth characteristics in the E-plane. A combined structure, consisting of metasurface slabs and a dielectric layer, is positioned above the antenna to augment the beamwidth and improve the impedance matching characteristic. The same effect can be achieved by optimizing the curvature of the exponential curves of the dipole edge to obtain a deformed dipole. To verify it, an 8 × 8 prototype is constructed and tested. The proposed design yields a 62.1% (2.5-4.75 GHz) bandwidth and a 2-D ± 60° beam-scanning capability. Gain fluctuation is basically less than 3 dB. The measured results are mostly in line with expectations.