Optimization of wearable microwave antenna with simplified electromagnetic model of the human body

• Published in: Open Physics 2017-12, Vol.15 (1), p.1055-1060
• Main Authors: Januszkiewicz, Łukasz, Barba, Paolo Di, Hausman, Sławomir
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 07.05.Tp; 84.40.Ba; automated optimal design; evolutionary optimization algorithms; finite-difference time-domain (FDTD); microwave wearable antenna; wireless body area network (WBAN)
• ISSN: 2391-5471; 2391-5471
• DOI: 10.1515/phys-2017-0133

In this paper the problem of optimization design of a microwave wearable antenna is investigated. Reference is made to a specific antenna design that is a wideband Vee antenna the geometry of which is characterized by 6 parameters. These parameters were automatically adjusted with an evolution strategy based algorithm EStra to obtain the impedance matching of the antenna located in the proximity of the human body. The antenna was designed to operate in the ISM (industrial, scientific, medical) band which covers the frequency range of 2.4 GHz up to 2.5 GHz. The optimization procedure used the finite-difference time-domain method based full-wave simulator with a simplified human body model. In the optimization procedure small movements of antenna towards or away of the human body that are likely to happen during real use were considered. The stability of the antenna parameters irrespective of the movements of the user’s body is an important factor in wearable antenna design. The optimization procedure allowed obtaining good impedance matching for a given range of antenna distances with respect to the human body.