Bandstop Filter Decoupling Technique for Miniaturized Reconfigurable MIMO Antenna

In this work, a switchable bandstop filter is used as a decoupling structure for developing a miniaturized reconfigurable multiple input multiple output (MIMO) antenna. Initially, a dual band ((2.43-2.60 GHz and 3.51-3.79 GHz)) single monopole antenna structure is developed on FR4 substrate. Then the single monopole antenna and its replica are accommodated in a small space with an edge to edge separation distance of 11 mm to form a 2 port MIMO antenna. Now, a switchable bandstop filter is used as a decoupling network between two closely spaced monopole antenna elements to prevent mutual coupling and reconfigure the antenna characteristics. The dual pole switchable bandstop filter is configured in such a way that one of its poles lies at 2.5 GHz in one state (Mode 1) and at 3.68 GHz in another state (Mode 2) under the switching action of two PIN diodes. Controlling the ON/OFF states of the PIN diodes in the bandstop filter, high isolation is achieved alternately in lower (2.43-2.60 GHz) and upper (3.51-3.79 GHz) frequency bands of the MIMO antenna. Also, stub network is used to improve impedance matching in the upper frequency band. The proposed isolation technique helps the antenna to yield high isolation (>30 dB), fair gain (>2.97 dBi), reasonable radiation efficiency (>86.8 %), low envelope correlation coefficient (< 0.16), high diversity gain (DG >9.88 dB), low Mean effective gain ratio (MEG 1/MEG 2 < 0.05 dB) and low channel capacity loss (CCL < 0.06 bits/s/Hz) for both the operating frequency bands. The overall dimension of the antenna is restricted to 44mm \times 198822mm ( 0.36\lambda {o}\,\,\times \,\,0.18\lambda {o} ) for its easy integration in compact wireless devices. This type of reconfigurable MIMO antenna is best suited for cognitive radio communication, which promotes efficient spectrum utilization.