Compact Metamaterial-Based Tunable Zeroth-Order Resonant Antenna with Chip Variable Capacitor

This letter presents a compact metamaterial-based tunable zeroth-order resonant antenna. It is based on the double-negative unit cell with a function of tunable inductance realized by a varactor and impedance convertor in the shunt branch. The resonant frequency of the designed antenna ranges from 2.31 to 3.08 GHz, depending on the capacitance of the used varactor. Its size is very compact ($0.05{\lambda}_0{\times}0.2{\lambda}_0$) with a relatively wide tunable range of 29.1%. The impedance bandwidth of the antenna is from 20 to 50 MHz for the resonant center frequency. The measured maximum total realized gain is from -0.68 dBi (2.43 GHz) to 1.69 dBi (2.97 GHz). The EM-simulated and measured results are in good agreement.