Abstract
This dissertation reports the design and fabrication of two kinds of micromachined monopole antennas; one is a flexible monopole antenna which was fabricated on parylene substrate, and the other is a 3D monopole antenna which was fabricated on both sides of a Pyrex 7740 glass wafer with through-hole connections. Flexible dual-band monopole antennas were designed with meander-shaped metal tracks, because this can efficiently reduce the physical dimensions of the overall antenna size and maintaining the required electrical path-length. Due to parylene’s excellent physical, mechanical and chemical properties such as low dielectric constant, high resistivity, and inertness to chemicals, it can serve as a substrate for an antenna in our study. The advantages of these antennas are their small size, light weight, low cost, dual-band characteristics, broad bandwidth, and flexible. A compact three dimensional MEMS monopole antenna for WLAN (802.11b) was also designed, fabricated, and measured. In order to reduce the size, the meandered monopole antenna was fabricated on both sides of a Pyrex 7740 glass wafer, and the metal lines on both sides were connected through via-holes. Measured performances of the fabricated 3-D antenna are in good agreement to the designed values in terms of operating frequency at 2.45 GHz and with a bandwidth of 190 MHz. This simple fabricated small size low cost antenna is suitable for mobile communication systems applications.