A Dynamic Dual Tapered 3-D Printed Nested Helical Antenna

Abstract

In this article, a new 3-D printed dual tapered nested antenna design is presented. The antenna is composed of two tapered helical arms that wrap around each other in opposite orientations to exhibit orthogonal circular polarization schemes. The nested tapered helices are 3-D laser printed with copper platting. The outer helical arm is tailored to resonate at 2.4 GHz, while the inner arm is designed for operation at 5.4 GHz. The overall antenna structure is then arranged as an array of elements that can dynamically alter its lattice in either linear or triangular topologies in order to achieve reconfiguration in the radiation pattern. The change in topologies is driven by programmable robots that can reshape the antenna array's radiation pattern dynamically and on demand. The whole system is measured and tested for various arrangements where the measured results show good agreement with the simulated data.