Unidirectional wideband 3-D antenna for human head-imaging application

A compact 3-D stacked patch antenna is presented for microwave head-imaging application. A stacked patch technique is utilized to achieve unidirectional radiation pattern, and a folding technique is used to achieve resonance at lower frequency, which are the requirements for imaging system. Shorting wall is introduced to minimize the overall antenna structure. The proposed antenna resonance frequency is 2.65-2.91 GHz with an average gain of 6.6 dBi at 2.7 GHz. The dimension of the antenna is 25 × 25×10.5mm 3 . The operating frequency of the proposed antenna is suitable for human brain imaging. The sensor characteristic of the proposed antenna is affiliated via connection with the imaging entity, miniaturized dimension, and high radiation efficiency. Raster scanning is deployed to achieve the 2-D image of the target phantom, and it is shown that the proposed highly directional antenna can detect a tumor inside the human brain phantom.