Gain Enhancement of Microstrip Antenna Using 3D Water-Based Metamaterial

In this paper, the totally transparent microstrip antenna consists of all dielectric materials is proposed for wireless communications. A water-based microstrip antenna is fed by an L-shaped probe. All dielectric water-based meta material (MM) unit-cell element consists of dielectric cubic boxes filled with water. It is designed and optimized for MM characteristics in the frequency band from 4 GHz to 4.4 GHz. A reconfigurable MM electric properties is achieved by changing the water height in the MM unit-cell element. A water-based MM lens consists of three layers is designed to collimate the radiation from the microstrip antenna. The phase compensation in the MM lens is achieved by changing the water heights in the MM unit-cell elements of the lens. A reconfigurable beam in different directions from −30° to +30° is steered by changing the water level distribution over the MM lens unit-cell elements. A fullwave analysis using the finite integration technique is used for the design and analysis of the water-based MM lens arrangements.