What are microstrip antennas? What are their advantages, disadvantages and applications

1.Microstrip antenna

The commonly used microstrip antenna is on a thin medium substrate, one side is attached with a thin metal layer as the ground, the other side is made of a certain shape of metal patch by means of photo etching and other methods, and the microstrip line, coaxial probe or electromagnetic coupling are used to feed the patch, which constitutes the microstrip antenna. As shown in figure 1.
Figure 1 rectangular microstrip antenna
Performance of microstrip antenna: microstrip antenna is generally used in 1GHz – 50GHz, special microstrip antenna can also be used in dozens of megahertz.

2.Advantages and disadvantages of microstrip antenna
Microstrip antenna is a new type of antenna developed gradually in the middle and late 20th century. Because of its advantages of small size, low cost, firm structure and simple process, it can also conveniently realize linear polarization or circular polarization and dual-frequency operation, so it is widely used in communication, broadcasting, aerospace and other fields.
Compared with common antennas, it has the following advantages:
Small size, lightweight, low profile, can be conformed to the carrier, and in addition to the feeding, point to open the lead hole, do not damage the mechanical structure of the carrier, which is especially beneficial for high-speed aircraft. Electrical performance diversification. The maximum radiation direction of different design microstrip elements can be adjusted from side to end, and various polarizations can be easily obtained. Can and active device, circuit integration as a unified component, so suitable for mass production, simplify the machine production and debugging, greatly reduce the cost.
The disadvantage is that:
The frequency band is narrow, mainly resonant microstrip antenna. Losses are high and therefore inefficient, similar to microstrip circuits. In particular, travelling-wave microstrip antenna has a large loss in matching load. The power capacity of a single microstrip antenna is small. Medium substrate has a great influence on performance. Due to the limitation of technological conditions, the uniformity and consistency of mass-produced media substrate are still not enough.

3.Microstrip antenna applications
In recent years, many improved microstrip antennas have been studied and designed, such as adding a thin metal connection pin between the microstrip patch and the grounding metal plate or etching a periodic structure on the dielectric plate or grounding plate to generate an electric tape gap.
Because the microstrip antenna has unique advantages and disadvantages are being overcome with the progress of science and technology, it has a broad application prospect. Generally speaking, it is in a superior position in the application of aircraft, can be used in satellite communications, antenna altimeters, missile measurement and control equipment, seeker, environmental monitoring equipment, common phase array and so on. Microstrip antennas also have advantages in-ground applications. In particular, various civil equipment with lower power, such as medical emblem wave probe, receiving array of direct broadcasting satellite and transceiver antenna of current Bluetooth equipment, have obvious advantages in millimetre band due to the integration of microstrip antenna.
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From：http://www.hj-antenna.com/microstrip-antennas-advantages-disadvantages-applications/