ANALYSIS OF BIO-INSPIRED AND FRACTAL MICROSTRIP ANTENNAS
Microstrip antenna, bio-inspired antenna, fractal antenna, Pythagorean tree.
Bio-inspired engineering is an interdisciplinary field of research, which includes specific areas such as: biology, engineering, physical sciences and biomimetics. The multiple and successful applications, in modern systems engineering inspired by biology's own mechanisms, have encouraged telecom researchers to use bio-inspired engineering to improve wireless communication systems. In this sense, this dissertation tries to investigate the applications of the natural anatomy of the leaves of the plants in microstrip antennas. In addition, a fractal antenna of multiband operation is presented, with a model created from an iterative function, known as the Tree of Pythagoras. The antennas are simulated on a fiberglass/epoxy FR-4 substrate with a dielectric constant of 4.4 and thickness of 1.57mm. The structures are analyzed using Ansoft Designer software, which implements the method of moments (MoM). Some prototypes are manufactured and measured using a vector network analyzer, for comparison purpose.