Stitched Ground Planes for Textile Antenna Application: An Experimental Study

Abstract

This paper presents an application of stitched ground plane for microstrip patch antenna design. In this work Matlab interface to computer embroidery techniques were used to implement the felt and denim substrates on microstrip patch antenna. These antennas were simulated using a commercial full 3D electromagnetic CST Microwave Studio 2019. A method to optimize the stitch patterns with conductive thread for antenna ground plane for 2.45 GHz industrial, scientific, and medical (ISM) band and 5 GHz wearable wireless local area networks (WLAN) frequencies was achieved. Rigid and flexible wearable antennas (microstrip patch antennas) were fabricated using the stitched ground plane. The electrical resistance was reduced between the meshes during the stitching design process. Results in terms of bandwidth, radiation patterns and reflection coefficients (S 11 ) are presented.