In this paper a novel, compact 10-bit chipless radio frequency identification (RFID) tag with stable readable characteristics is proposed. The tag is composed of several concentric novel kite-shaped loop resonators. The desired data sequence is obtained by the insertion or removal of nested elements, offering a 1:1 data bit to resonance correspondence. Each data sequence is encoded in the spectral domain of the tag. The proposed tag shows operability at different polarizations and incident angles of the impinging electromagnetic waves. Operating within the ultra-wideband (UWB), the tag is realized on the Roger RT/duroid^® 5880 substrate having physical dimensions of 13.55 × 13.55 mm². The measurement results of the design reveal a high code density and spectral efficiency of 5.44 bits/cm² and 2 bits/GHz, respectively. The compact and robust passive chipless RFID tag having scalable data storage potential can be deployed in numerous low-profile applications such as those of wearable and healthcare.

This paper is focused on providing a viable solution to wearable antenna performance disconcertment caused by the underlying human body. Direct placement of the antenna on the body yields undesired results owing to the frequency detuning effect. The simplest possible way out is to make use of a metallic reflector. Hence, a reflector backed antenna is presented for 5.8 GHz ISM band with total lateral dimensions of 28 × 28 × 13.58 mm3. The reflector makes use of a conformal high dielectric laminate coated with a thin copper layer owing to which the assembled design achieves low SAR (Specific Absorption Rate). The prototype provides excellent results at the cost of some extra volume occupation in an off-body direction. Another AMC (Artificial Magnetic Conductor) backed technique is followed and implemented separately to have the structural compactness lacking in the former case. The antenna at hand is backed by a 2 × 2 array of AMC unit cells. The overall design dimensions are reduced. The reflector backed design achieves 8.2 dB gain, above 90% efficiency, and 99% bandwidth overlap with the primary antenna. The AMC backed design provides good spectrum coverage from 5.73 to 5.94 GHz with high gain. Free space response, on-body performance, and investigation of SAR analysis of the proposed designs substantiate effective wireless data transfer in body-centric communication. 

A novel low-profile metal mountable UHF RFID tag antenna is presented. The tag antenna design consists of two resonating patches with different resonant frequencies fed through a joint inductive loop. This design topology offers benefits such as bandwidth enhancement in the single band and the possibility of attaining a tunable dualband coverage in the UHF RFID band. The proposed antenna structure doesn't require any electrical connection (shorting pins/shorting plates/via holes) and therefore facilitates fabrication through a conventional RFID inlay manufacturing process. Fabrication and testing of a prototype of the proposed antenna design are carried out. The prototype antenna achieves free space and an on-metal reading range of better than 8 m and 11 m respectively in the US RFID band of 902-928 MHz.

A structurally compact, semiflexible wearable antenna composed of a distinctively miniaturized electromagnetic band gap (EBG) structure is presented in this work. Designed for body-centric applications in the 5.8 GHz band, the design draws heavily from a novel planar geometry realized on Rogers RT/duroid 5880 laminate with a compact physical footprint spanning lateral dimensions of 0.6 lambda 0 x 0.06 lambda 0. Incorporating a 2 x 2 EBG structure at the rear of the proposed design ensures sufficient isolation between the body and the antenna, doing away with the performance degradation associated with high permittivity of the tissue layer. The peculiar antenna geometry allows for reduced backward radiation and low specific absorption rate (SAR). With the inclusion of EBG, the gain of the antenna undergoes a considerable increase to 7.2 dBi with more than 95% reduction in SAR value. In addition, the front-to-back ratio also amplified to 13 dB. A rigorous analysis detailing the structural robustness is reported for varied bend angle configurations of the proposed antenna. To assess the suitability of the proposed design as a body-worn antenna, an experimental investigation is carried out on different parts of the body. Experimental findings are congruent with computationally obtained results, validating the applicability of the novel antenna structure for body-worn applications.

A flexible, spiral-shaped frequency reconfigurable antenna with a compact size (20 x 24 mm(2)) is presented. The proposed antenna has a low-profile planar structure and is able to operate at five different frequency bands, i.e., 4.19-4.48, 5.98-6.4, 3.42-4.0, 5.4-5.68, and 6.8-7.0 GHz. The multiband operation enables the antenna to cover aeronautical radio navigation, fixed satellite communication, WLAN, and WiMAX standards. A radiating element is backed by Rogers (R) 5880 substrate with a thickness of 0.508 mm and dielectric constant of 2.2. The spiral shape is achieved by introducing different strips. Frequency reconfiguration is achieved by the incorporation of a lumped element in a strip, so that the antenna can switch between different resonances. To validate the performance of the antenna, the prototype of the design was fabricated and tested. Good acquiescent is seen between simulated and measured results. The proposed antenna operates efficiently with appreciable return loss, directivity, bandwidth, and peak gain.

This article presents a 12-bit frequency coded chipless RFID system in the frequency range of 3 to 6 GHz. The system consists of a fully printable chipless tag and a pair of high-gain reader antennas. The tag also incorporates its own antennas to improve the read range. Information is encoded into frequency spectrum using a multi-resonant circuit. The circuit consists of multiple microstrip U and L-shaped open stub resonators patterned in a unique configuration. The proposed configuration aids in capturing more data in a reduced space as well as tunable frequency operation. Tag and reader antennas utilize techniques such as stepped impedance feeding line, defective partial ground plane, and stair-step patch structure to achieve wide-band impedance bandwidth in miniature size. The results of the wireless measurements in the non-anechoic environment show that the proposed system has a reading range of more than 20 cm. The presented system possesses great potential for low-cost short-range inventory tracking.

RFID tag antennas with stable performance on the diverse electromagnetic mounting platforms are an integral part of the ubiquitous RFID systems. This research article presents a novel tag antenna design that facilitates the said objective. The proposed antenna consists of a modified H-shaped slot structure that ensures considerable robustness from the application environment through confining the surface current density within the antenna structure. The antenna offers a tunable bandwidth of 40 MHz within the microwave band of (2.4-2.5) GHz. The proposed tag antenna exhibits excellent response on metallic platforms of different sizes and thicknesses with an effective gain of almost four times of that in free space. Furthermore, the designed tag antenna performs adequately well on low-medium permittivity dielectrics (glass, paper, and plastic) and RF absorbers (water). The free space and on-metal performance of the proposed tag antenna are verified by testing a prototype realized on the FR4 substrate.

A novel, cedar-shaped, coplanar waveguide-fed frequency reconfigurable antenna is proposed. The presented antenna uses low-cost FR4 substrate with a thickness of 1.6 mm. Four PIN diodes are inserted on the antenna surface to variate the current distribution and alter the resonant frequencies with different combinations of switches. The proposed antenna is fabricated and measured for all states, and a good agreement is seen between measured and simulated results. This antenna resonates within the range of 2 GHz to 10 GHz, covering the major wireless applications of aviation service, wireless local area network (WLAN), worldwide interoperability for microwave access (WiMAX), long distance radio telecommunications, and X-band satellite communication. The proposed antenna works resourcefully with reasonable gain, significant bandwidth, directivity, and reflection coefficient. The proposed multiband reconfigurable antenna will pave the way for future wireless communications including WLAN, WiMAX, and possibly fifth-generation (5G) communication.

In this work, an integrated antenna system with Defected Ground Structure (DGS) is presented for Fourth Generation (4G) and millimeter (mm)-wave Fifth Generation (5G) wireless applications and handheld devices. The proposed design with overall dimensions of 110 mm x 75 mm is modeled on 0.508 mm thick Rogers RT/Duroid 5880 substrate. Radiating structure consists of antenna arrays excited by the T-shape 1 x 2 power divider/combiner. Dual bands for 4G centered at 3.8 GHz and 5.5 GHz are attained, whereas the 10-dB impedance bandwidth of 24.4 - 29.3 GHz is achieved for the 5G antenna array. In addition, a peak gain of 5.41 dBi is demonstrated across the operating bandwidth of the 4G antenna array. Similarly, for the 5G mm-wave configuration the attained peak gain is 10.29 dBi. Moreover, significant isolation is obtained between the two antenna modules ensuring efficient dual-frequency band operation using a single integrated solution. To endorse the concept, antenna prototype is fabricated and far-field measurements are procured. Simulated and measured results exhibit coherence. Also the proposed design is investigated for the beam steering capability of the mm-wave 5G antenna array using CST(R)MWS(R). The demonstrated structure offers various advantages including compactness, wide bandwidth, high gain, and planar configuration. Hence, the attained radiation characteristics prove the suitability of the proposed design for the current and future wireless handheld devices.

In this paper, we analyze the impact of buffer-aided full-duplex successive relay selection schemes with energy harvesting capability of relay nodes in amplifying and forward (AF) and decode and forward (DF) relaying environments for the Internet of Things networks. We propose to select a relay pair based on the energy harvested and signal strength at relay and destination to receive and transmit in the same time slot, respectively. Contrary to the previous relay pair selection schemes which are based on the signal strength only and cause the relay overuse problem, the proposed scheme ensures the balanced use of energy of relay nodes. The proposed relay selection scheme is implemented with the time switching (TS) and power splitting (PS)-based energy harvesting models in AF and DF relaying environments separately. Furthermore, we derive the closed-form expression of the outage probability and average throughput for both the TS and PS approaches in the DF and AF relaying modes. We compare the proposed relay selection scheme with the S-MMRS scheme and prove that the proposed scheme significantly reduces the outage probability and improves the average throughput. Furthermore, the analytical findings are reinforced with the extensive Monte Carlo simulations.