Apple Inc.

Forhad Hasnat

David Garrido Lopez

Harish Rajagopalan

Rodney Andres Gomez Angulo

Subramanian Ramalingam

Mikal Askarian Amiri

Panagiotis Theofanopoulos

Bilgehan Avser

Robert Scritzky

Mattia Pascolini

Matthew D Hill

Siwen Yong

Daniel C Wagman

Jennifer M Edwards

Simone Paulotto

Jiangfeng Wu

Melody L Kuna

Lu Zhang

Eric N Nyland

Ihtesham H Chowdhury

Carli E Oster

Carlo Catalano

David A Hurrell

Stuart M Nevill

Alexander P Niemeyer

Thomas W Yang

Soroush Akbarzadeh

Jiechen Wu

Jordi Antoni Garcia Selva

Aobo Li

Russell K Williams

Colden N Eldridge

Brandon Z Frank

Matthew J Wilander

An electronic device may be provided with a phased antenna array that radiates at a frequency greater than 10 GHz. The array may include a first set of dielectric resonator antennas arranged in a first row and a second set of dielectric resonator antennas in a second row offset from the first row. Each dielectric resonator antenna may have dielectric resonating element with a base portion and a stepped portion. The stepped portions of the antennas in the first set may be arranged to be distant from the stepped portions of the antennas in the second set. The antennas in the first set may be arranged to be more distant from an electronic device sidewall than the antennas in the second set. Configured in this manner, the array may exhibit reduced inter-coupling between dielectric resonator antennas in the first set and dielectric resonator antennas in the second set.

Electronic devices with dielectric resonator antennas

An electronic device may be provided with a phased antenna array having a dielectric resonator antenna. The antenna may include a first dielectric block on a printed circuit, a second dielectric block on the first dielectric block, and a third dielectric block on the second dielectric block. At least the second and third dielectric blocks may have different dielectric constants. A parasitic element may be disposed between the second and third dielectric resonating elements and/or a parasitic element may be disposed on a radiative face of the third dielectric resonating element. The parasitic elements may act as electromagnetic mirrors that form images of electric fields in the dielectric resonating elements. The images may make the dielectric resonating elements exhibit a greater electromagnetic height than physical height. This may allow for a reduction in the overall physical height of the dielectric resonator antenna without sacrificing wireless performance.

Multi-layer dielectric resonator antennas with parasitic elements

An electronic device may be provided with a phased antenna array having a dielectric resonator antenna. The antenna may include a first dielectric block on a printed circuit, a second dielectric block on the first dielectric block, and a third dielectric block on the second dielectric block. At least the second and third dielectric blocks may have different dielectric constants. The antenna may be fed by one or more feed probes. Each feed probe may include respective conductive via and a conductive patch coupled to the conductive via. The conductive via may extend through the first dielectric block. The conductive patch may be sandwiched between the first and second dielectric blocks. The conductive patch may have a width that configures the conductive patch to form a smooth impedance transition between the conductive via and each of the dielectric blocks despite the different materials used to form the antenna.

Feed patches for multi-layer dielectric resonator antennas

An electronic device may be provided with a phased antenna array that radiates at a frequency greater than 10 GHz. The array may include a dielectric resonator antenna having a dielectric column with non-planar sidewalls that include planar portions and corrugated portions with grooves and ridges, that include sidewall steps, and/or that include angled sidewall portions. The dielectric resonator antenna may include a first dielectric column and a second dielectric column stacked on the first dielectric column. The second column may be narrower and may have a higher dielectric constant than the first column or may have the same width but a lower dielectric constant than the first column. This may serve to broaden the bandwidth of the dielectric resonator antenna relative to scenarios where the dielectric resonator antenna includes only a single dielectric resonating element having only planar sidewalls.

Electronic devices with dielectric resonator antennas having non-planar sidewalls

An electronic device may include a conductive housing with a rear wall and a sidewall. A display may be mounted to the sidewall and may include a conductive display structure separated from the sidewall by a slot. An antenna arm may be interposed between the conductive display structure and the rear wall. A first inductor may couple the conductive display structure to the housing and may compensate for a distributed capacitance between the antenna arm and the conductive display structure. A second inductor may couple the antenna arm to the rear wall and may compensate for a distributed capacitance between the antenna arm and the rear wall. A speaker may be co-located with the antenna. A third inductor may couple the antenna arm to the rear wall to allow antenna currents to bypass the speaker.

Electronic devices with display-overlapping antennas

An electronic device may be provided with an antenna module having a substrate. A phased antenna array of dielectric resonator antennas and a radio-frequency integrated circuit for the array may be mounted to one or more surfaces of the substrate. The dielectric resonator antennas may include dielectric columns excited by feed probes. The feed probes may be printed onto sidewalls of the dielectric columns or may be pressed against the sidewalls by biasing structures. A plastic substrate may be molded over each dielectric column and each of the feed probes in the array. The feed probes may cover multiple polarizations. The array may include elements for covering multiple frequency bands. The dielectric columns may be aligned a longitudinal axis and may be rotated at a non-zero and non-perpendicular angle with respect to the longitudinal axis.

Dielectric resonator antenna modules

A portable electronic device can include a housing defining an aperture and a display positioned in the aperture. The display and the housing can define an internal volume and a speaker assembly can be positioned in the internal volume. The speaker assembly can include a speaker enclosure sealed to the housing within the internal volume, the speaker enclosure and the housing defining a speaker volume, and a speaker module in fluid communication with the speaker volume, the speaker module including a diaphragm positioned at an aperture defined by the speaker volume, the diaphragm defining multiple ridges.

Portable electronic device

An electronic device may have a first conductive sidewall at an upper end, a second conductive sidewall at a lower end, and a conductive rear wall. First and second antennas may be formed at the upper end and may include slots with edges defined by the first sidewall and the rear wall. Third, fourth, fifth, and sixth antennas may be formed at the lower end and may include slots with edges defined by the second sidewall and the rear wall. Each antenna may cover multiple frequency bands. First order and third order modes of the slots may contribute to the frequency responses of the third through sixth antennas. A display controller may be mounted at the lower end and may impose a lower limit on the frequencies covered by the third through sixth antennas. The first and second antennas may cover lower frequencies than the third through sixth antennas.

Electronic devices having antennas for covering multiple frequency bands

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Cupertino, CA, United States of America

Forhad Hasnat