Design of Small Multi-band Full-screen Smartwatch Antenna for IoT applications

TL;DR

This paper presents a novel multi-band smartwatch antenna design that leverages the smartwatch's intrinsic modes to achieve omni-directional radiation, small size, and full-screen compatibility for IoT applications.

Contribution

A new method utilizing characteristic mode analysis to design multi-band antennas that fully exploit smartwatch structures for improved IoT connectivity.

Findings

Achieved four 0.5-wavelength modes with the proposed design.

The antenna exhibits omni-directional radiation and compact size.

The method enhances smartwatch antenna performance for IoT use.

Abstract

Smartwatch is a potential candidate for the Internet of Things (IoT) hub. However, the performance of smartwatch antennas is severely restricted by the smartwatch structure, especially when the antennas are designed by traditional methods. For adapting smartwatches to the role of IoT hub, a novel method of designing multi-band smartwatch antenna is presented in this paper, aiming at increasing the number of frequency bands, omni-directivity, and structural suitability. Firstly, the fundamental structure (including the full screen and the system PCB) of the smartwatch is analyzed as a whole by characteristic mode analysis (CMA). Thus, abundant resources of characteristic modes are introduced. The fundamental structure is then modified as the radiator of a multi-band antenna. Then, a non-radiating capacitive coupling element (CCE) excites the desired four 0.5-wavelength modes from this structure. This method could fully utilize the intrinsic modes of the smartwatch structure itself, thus exhibits multiple advantages: significantly small size, smaller ground, omni-directional radiation, and fitting to the full-screen smartwatch structure.