Influence Analysis of ZrO2 Ceramic for Cellular Phones on 5G mm-Wave Antenna Performance

In this paper, the influences of Zr02 ceramic on the fifth generation mobile communications (5G) millimeter-wave (mm-Wave) antenna performance are studied. A 28-GHz 2 x 2 non-stacked patch antenna array and a 28-GHz 2 x 2 stacked patch antenna array are designed on dielectric substrates as the performance baseline. Based on the two types of antenna arrays, various Zr02 ceramic thicknesses and various gaps between the Zr02 ceramic and the antenna arrays are simulated to get quick understanding of the Zr02 ceramic influence on the antenna performance. From the simulated results, it can be found that the Zr02 ceramic has different influences on different types of antenna arrays. Besides, for both of the two types of antenna arrays, when the thicknesses of Zr02 ceramic are close or equal to integer multiples of 0.5 guided wavelengths Oog), the antenna performance in the material-loading cases gets close to that in the free space (FS). Also, when the thicknesses of Zr02 ceramic are close or equal to odd multiples of 0.25 ng and the gaps between the Zr02 ceramic and the antenna array are close or equal to integer multiples 0.5 FS wavelengths (n.o), the focusing effects of electromagnetic (EM) beams get significant for both arrays. The findings comply with the EM wave propagation theory and can be applied to radome designs of Terahertz (THz) antenna arrays.