WWAN ceramic chip antenna for mobile phone application

A promising compact ceramic chip antenna capable of generating two wide operating bands at about 900 and 2000 MHz for covering GSM850/900/1800/1900/UMTS WWAN (wireless wide area network) operation is presented. The antenna comprises a ceramic chip base of high relative permittivity 40 and small volume 2.5 × 5 × 40 mm3 (0.5 cm3) and a simple metal pattern embedded therein. The metal pattern is of an asymmetric T-shape with two different simple radiating arms; no meandering in the metal pattern is used, which is different from the meandered-type metal pattern used in conventional chip antennas. Without meandering in the metal pattern, the possible large coupling between the adjacent portions in the metal pattern can be avoided. Large operating bandwidths are hence promising to be achieved. Also, without meandering in the metal pattern, the proposed chip antenna can still occupy a small volume for WWAN operation. The small volume allows it easy for the proposed antenna to incorporate the possible electronic elements such as the speaker and the lens of the embedded camera at the top portion of the system circuit board of the mobile phone to achieve a compact integration. Details of the proposed ceramic chip antenna are presented and studied. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 51: 103–110, 2009; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/mop.24020