Cost-Effective Dual-Polarized Millimeter-Wave Reconfigurable Reflect-Array Antenna

This letter presents a novel dual-polarized millimeter-wave reconfigurable reflect-array antenna (RRA) with a cost-effective design. The proposed RRA element features two sets of orthogonal and rotationally symmetrical dipoles, each integrating only one p-i-n diode, which reduces the cost of active components and simplifies the layout of biasing circuits. By controlling the states of the corresponding-polarized diode, independent 1-bit phase shifts can be achieved for dual-linear polarizations. A 16 × 16-element RRA prototype is simulated, fabricated, and tested, with measurement and simulation results showing a good agreement. Both polarizations demonstrate independent 2-D beam scanning capabilities, with a maximum scanning angle of 50° and a gain drop of 3.1 dB. The maximum measured realized gains for <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">x</i>- and <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">y</i>-polarization are 19.4 dBi and 20.1 dBi, corresponding to aperture efficiencies of 13.3% and 15.7%, respectively.