Design of a compact two element MIMO antenna with improved bandwidth and isolation

Abstract

The ever increasing demand for high data rates drives the wireless communication standards towards incorporation of multi input multi output (MIMO) technology. For such systems, the designed antenna must be compact with low profile configuration, good impedance bandwidth and low mutual coupling. In this paper, a compact two-element microstrip antenna operating from 5.8-9.2 GHz is proposed for wireless applications. The simulated antenna resonates at 7.5 GHz frequency, with a 10 dB fractional impedance bandwidth of 45.33% and voltage standing wave ratio (VSWR) of 1.15. The mutual coupling is reduced to around 21 dB at the resonant frequency. For the proposed antenna return loss at 7.5 GHz is 23 dB. The antenna system has a radiation efficiency of 88.16% at the center frequency. The performance of the proposed antenna array is better than the existing microstrip antennas in terms of fractional impedance bandwidth and isolation.