A low complexity direction finding system based on a six-port integrated MIMO antenna system

Abstract

In this paper, a low complexity microwave based direction finding (DF) system is presented. The proposed system consists of single six-port (SP) circuit integrated with a reconfigurable multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) antenna system. The proposed design is a complete integrated solution with DF capabilities for cognitive radio platforms. The design is suitable to be used in compact wireless handheld and mobile communication devices. The SP circuit covers a wide frequency band (1.68~2.25 GHz) while the reconfigurable MIMO antenna system cover several frequency bands between 0.7 GHz to 3 GHz. The fabricated integrated system achieves ±16° accuracy in its direction of arrival estimates.