Design of Wearable Antenna System on Different Materials & Their Performance Analysis at the Off and On Body Environment in terms of Impedance Matching and Radiation Characteristics

Abstract

This paper aims to design textile microstrip patch antennas on three different high performance fabric materials as substrates and a conventional patch antenna on FR-4 (PCB) substrate, imposed on human body environment for wireless body area network (WBAN) applications. It also compares the performance of the designed antennas at the on and off body environment. These antennas operate on ISM 2.45 GHz frequency band. Electro textile materials, Panama fabric (ε_r= 2.12), Fleece (ε_r =2.22) and Dacron fabric (ε_r =3) as well as PCB material (ε_r =4.3) are used as the antenna substrates. A human body model having three layers (skin, fat and muscle) is then developed and the antennas are applied on this body model to investigate their characteristics and performance and also the impact of human body layers on these antennas.