Artificial materials for microwave applications

This thesis has focussed on the properties and manufacturing techniques of artificial RF materials. These artificial materials can be divided into two types depending on the whether their individual unit cell is resonant or non-resonant. Both these types have been discussed. It has been shown that the efficiency and bandwidth of a patch antenna using a flexible 3D printed substrate can be improved by using composite materials as heterogeneous substrates. Composite materials with a large range of relative permittivity values were manufactured by combing 3D printing with commercial laminates. An equation to design such composite materials has been presented. The engineering tolerance and repeatability of 3D printing as a manufacturing process to fabricate ‘on demand’ dielectrics has been presented. [Continues.]