Groundless Eco-Friendly Water and PLA Based Artificial Magnetic Conductor

A groundless, eco-friendly, water and PLA based Artificial Magnetic Conductor (AMC) is presented in this manuscript, completely eliminating the need for metallic components. Environmental concerns are becoming a significant focus in many research fields, where the emphasis is not only on performance improvement but also on the sustainability of the devices manufacturing process. The proposed multilayer structure was designed by exploiting accurate numerical simulations. Specifically, the absence of a metallic ground is compensated by the insertion of a water-filled cavity, which improves isolation between the two AMC sides. The prototype was constructed by using commercially available PLA, printed with a standard 3D machine, and filled with distilled water in the required areas. The structure exhibits an excellent electromagnetic behavior as a Perfect Magnetic Conductor (PMC) in the 2–4 GHz band, as verified through waveguide measurements. The obtained AMC bandwidth is relatively large, being approximately 45% centered around 3.55 GHz.