U.S. Philips Corporation

Frank Heinrichs

Rebekka Porath

Peter Johan Massey

Tilman Schlenker

The invention relates to a dielectric resonator antenna ( ) as well as a transmitter, a receiver and a mobile radiotelephone that includes a dielectric resonator antenna. To improve known possibilities of reducing the volume of the DRA ( ), which are offered by the planes of symmetry ( ) in a DRA, there is proposed to provide an electrically conducting coating on at least one curved surface ( ) into which the tangential component of an electric field of an eigenmode assigned to the dielectric resonator antenna ( ) disappears. As a result, the volume of the DRA ( ) can be reduced considerably, although furthermore the same mode is found at the same frequency. Since there are a plurality of such curved surfaces ( ), a particularly advantageous surface ( ) can be selected depending, for example, on the desired degree of miniaturization, required bandwidth of the evolving antenna and manufacturing conditions.

Dielectric resonator antenna

A dielectric resonator antenna is a cuboid having a first edge, a second edge and a third edge. The first edge is the shortest edge and forms part of a first surface and a second surface of the cuboid. The first surface is for coupling to a transmission line and the second surface is for mounting on a circuit board. The second and third edges have substantially equal lengths. Further, the first and second surfaces are coated with a conducting layer.

A dielectric resonator antenna has a dielectric layer and a conducting layer formed on a main surface of the dielectric layer. An electrical contact is formed on the main surface for connecting the dielectric layer to a transmission line for transferring a signal between the dielectric layer and the transmission line. The electrical contact is insulated from the conducting layer. A conducting strip is connected to the electrical contact and is on a side surface of the dielectric layer. The side surface is not on the same plane of the main surface. Rather, the side surface is perpendicular to the main surface of the dielectric layer.

A transmitter-receiver for four different frequency ranges of two transmission systems has four dielectric resonator antennas (DRAs) for each frequency range to improve and a simplify separation of different frequency ranges. Two DRA's are provided for reception and transmission in the first transmission system, and two other DRA's are provided for reception and transmission in the second transmission system.

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Aachen, Germany

Frank Heinrichs