NOVEL ELECTRO-TEXTILE PATCH ANTENNA ON JEANS SUBSTRATE FOR WEARABLE APPLICATIONS

This paper aimed to take closer steps towards real wearability by investigating the possibilities of designing and fabricating highly efficient and fully flexible wearable microstrip patch antenna for operating frequency of 5.8 GHz as a center frequency. Two types of conducting materials have been used for conducting parts: conventional metal plane and woven electro-textile material, while a non-conducting jeans fabric has been used as antenna substrate material. The dielectric constant εr = 1.78, and loss tangent tan δ = 0.085 of the jeans substrate measured by using two different methods. Also, the electromagnetic properties of the electro-textile are studied in details. The conductivity of etextile cell is equal to 2.5×106 S/m and the surface impedance of e-textile cell equal to 0.0395+J18.4Ω. Furthermore, the proposed wearable antenna may be attached to human body, so the specific absorption ratio (SAR) must be calculated. Finally, the proposed design is simulated by CST simulator version 2016, fabricated using folded copper and measured by Agilent8719ES VNA.