A MW/MMW shared-aperture antenna supporting two-dimension beam steering in MMW band

In this paper, a partial structure reuse technology is adopted to realize the shared-aperture microwave (MW)/millimeter-wave (MMW) antenna capable of two-dimensional beam steering (end-fire and broadside radiation) in the MMW band. The proposed design integrates an MW PIFA with two MMW arrays based on patch and dipole, where selected parts of the MW PIFA are reused to support the operation of the MMW arrays. To validate the design, prototypes are manufactured and experimentally characterized. The measurements confirm that the antenna achieves operating ranges of 2.38–3.58 GHz (40.1%) covering LTE for MW and 24.3–29.7 GHz (20%) covering n275 and n258 for the MMW bands. Each MMW array is capable of steering its beam from − 50° to + 50°, enabling complementary spatial coverage. The overall antenna occupies a compact footprint of 0.42 × 0.14 × 0.01 λ 01 , where λ 01 denotes the free-space wavelength at 3 GHz, demonstrating its suitability for 6G terminal platforms.