Performance Analysis of Conformal Slotted Hexagonal Patch Antenna

Abstract

This paper presents the design and performance analysis of a hexagon-shaped microstrip patch antenna and a slotted hexagon patch antenna for wideband wireless communication applications. The proposed antennas were designed and simulated using CST Microwave Studio on three different substrate materials, namely FR4 (?r = 4.3), Rogers RO3003 (?r = 3.0), and Polyimide (?r = 3.5), to investigate the influence of dielectric properties on antenna characteristics. The conventional hexagon patch antenna achieved wideband operation with impedance bandwidths of 3.9 GHz, 4.4 GHz, and 4.2 GHz for FR4, Rogers RO3003, and Polyimide substrates, respectively. To further enhance the antenna performance, a slot was introduced into the hexagonal patch, and conformal analysis was carried out under bending angles of 25°, 30°, 35°, 40°, and 45°. The slotted antenna maintained stable resonant frequencies, wide impedance bandwidths, and acceptable gain values under all bending conditions. Among the investigated substrates, Rogers RO3003 exhibited the best performance with a maximum bandwidth of 4.47 GHz and a gain of 3.5 dB, while Polyimide demonstrated excellent flexibility and impedance matching characteristics with a return loss of ?48.7 dB. The proposed antenna structures provide wide operating frequency coverage from approximately 1.9 GHz to 6.4 GHz, making them suitable for WLAN, WiMAX, Sub-6 GHz 5G, IoT devices, wireless sensor networks, wearable electronics, and conformal communication systems.