A low-profile, broadband, circularly polarized (CP) antenna integrated with solar cells is proposed for use in CubeSats. The antenna is a single-feed printed crossed-dipole radiator on a metasurface reflector that consists of a lattice of square solar cells mounted on a grounded dielectric substrate. The radiator is designed to allow 100% insolation of the solar cells when directly facing a light source. The metasurface is used as an artificial reflector of the crossed dipole to achieve a low-profile as well as broadband characteristics. The low-profile design could also minimize shadowing of the solar cells for oblique angle insolation. The final prototype with an overall size of 100 mm × 100 mm × 5.9 mm (0.75λo × 0.75λo × 0.044λo at 2.25 GHz) yields a |S11| < -10 dB bandwidth of 2.02-2.58 GHz and a 3-dB axial ratio bandwidth of 2.12-2.44 GHz. The antenna radiated a good broadside right-hand CP wave with a high broadside gain and high radiation efficiency within the operational bandwidth.
This work was supported by the Human Resources Program in Energy Technology of the Korea Institute of Energy Technology Evaluation and Planning, granted financial resources from the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, South Korea, under Grant 20164030201380 and by Institute for Information & Communications Technology Promotion (IITP) grant funded by the Korea government (MSIP) (No. 2017-0-00959, University ICT Basic Research Lab).This work was also supported by Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology (Project code VT-CN.03/18-20).
