Wideband Dual-Polarized Metasurface Antenna With Fan Beams for Outdoor Wi-Fi Applications

This article presents a miniaturized, high-gain antenna array that generates ±45° polarized fan beams across the 5.15–6.21 GHz band for outdoor Wi-Fi applications. The antenna structure consists of a patch antenna followed by two cascaded metasurfaces (MTSs), specifically arranged from the feed port upward as a patch antenna, MTS-A, and MTS-B. The patch antenna produces ±45° polarized fields; MTS-A simultaneously enhances the bandwidth and the gain, while MTS-B broadens the horizontal beamwidth. Spectrum analysis of the aperture fields reveals that, in this design, beam broadening arises from energy redistribution. A prototype was designed, fabricated, and measured. Both simulation and measurement results confirm the generation of a fan beam in the horizontal direction—the array’s narrow dimension—and a narrow beam in the vertical direction. The horizontal half-power beamwidth (HPBW) reaches $102^{\circ } ~\pm ~7^{\circ } $ , with an average gain of 15.3 dBi. Compared to conventional fan beam antennas, the proposed design achieves a broadband operation, high gains, and stable wide beamwidths within a very compact aperture, making it a promising solution for dual-polarized outdoor Wi-Fi applications.