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![A 5.8 GHz patch antenna built with PLA substrates and copper tape for the radiating patch and the ground plane soldered to 50 Ω SMA connectors [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]](profile/Umar-Hasni/publication/329455467/figure/fig9/AS:11431281176287218@1690096781654/A-58-GHz-patch-antenna-built-with-PLA-substrates-and-copper-tape-for-the-radiating-patch.png)
A 5.8 GHz patch antenna built with PLA substrates and copper tape for the radiating patch and the ground plane soldered to 50 Ω SMA connectors [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
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3D printing is becoming increasingly popular due to its convenience, ease of use, and low cost. Companies such as Ford, General Electric Aviation, and many others are using 3D printing for rapid prototyping before investing time and money in volume manufacturing. However, development in 3D‐printed microwave antennas has remained limited. In this st...
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Citations
... The antenna was designed to operate in the 2.4 GHz band and had a peak gain of −2.78 dBi. U. Hasni et al. [18] showcased the fabrication of a microstrip rectangular patch using PLA substrate and Black magic 3D conductive filament. The 3D-printed antenna exhibited a peak gain of −1.6 dBi at a frequency of 5.8 GHz. ...
With the development of new wireless communication systems, antennas will require excellent characteristics, including high gain, wide bandwidth, and low losses. 3D printing creates structures through an additive process, layer by layer, which enables the manufacturing of antennas with 3D shapes in a cheaper, faster, and more flexible manner. This paper presents a new design for a 3D-printed microstrip patch antenna in the Wi-Fi band with the objective of improving the performance of planar 3D-printed patch antennas. The antenna is fabricated using PLA (Polylactic Acid) as the substrate, Electrifi conductive filament and cooper tape ground. In order to improve the radiation characteristics and overall efficiency of the antenna, two different three-dimensional forms (pyramid and frame) are employed to optimize key parameters, contributing to improved radiation characteristics and overall efficiency. A comparative analysis is presented, highlighting the advantages of the proposed design over traditional two-dimensional counterparts. The experimental results demonstrate enhanced bandwidth and gain, showcasing the potential of the 3D microstrip patch antenna for advanced wireless communication applications.
... In the future, composite formation and modification will be possible due to the processability of PLA to obtain grafts with optimized mechanical properties. 47,48 The selected conductive filament is a PLA composite containing graphene, which has primarily been explored for use as printable sensors, resistors, and other electronic applications, [49][50][51][52][53][54][55] but not yet evaluated for biomedical use for in vitro or in vivo applications. Prior to in vitro cell analysis, the PLA and CPLA materials were evaluated to assess their surface characteristics and thermal properties. ...
Various methods have been used to treat bone defects caused by genetic disorders, injury, or disease. Yet, there is still great need to develop alternative approaches to repair damaged bone tissue. Bones naturally exhibit piezoelectric potential, or the ability to convert mechanical stresses into electrical impulses. This phenomenon has been utilized clinically to enhance bone regeneration in conjunction with electrical stimulation (ES) therapies; however, oftentimes with critical‐sized bone defects, the bioelectric potential at the site of injury is compromised, resulting in less desirable outcomes. In the present study, the potential of a 3D‐printed conductive polymer blend to enhance bone formation through restoration of the bioelectrical microenvironment was evaluated. A commercially available 3D printer was used to create circular, thin‐film scaffolds consisting of either polylactide (PLA) or a conductive PLA (CPLA) composite. Preosteoblast cells were seeded onto the scaffolds and subjected to direct current ES via a purpose‐built cell culture chamber. It was found that CPLA scaffolds had no adverse effects on cell viability, proliferation or differentiation when compared with control scaffolds. The addition of ES, however, resulted in a significant increase in the expression of osteocalcin, a protein indicative of osteoblast maturation, after 14 days of culture. Furthermore, xylenol orange staining also showed the presence of increased mineralized calcium nodules in cultures undergoing stimulation. This study demonstrates the potential for low‐cost, conductive scaffolding materials to support cell viability and enhance in vitro mineralization in conjunction with ES.
... 3D printer are a cost-efficient solution for manufacturing of complex microwave designs such as in Garcia-Martinez and colleagues. [27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36] Here to have a design with a shorter length, the substrates is modeled as nonplanar substrate. This feature can be obtained easily by using the unique feature of 3D printing technology. ...
Herein, by using 3D printing technology and data‐driven surrogate model‐assisted optimization method, design of a ceramic material‐based nonuniform nonplanar microstrip filter is taken into the consideration in a computationally efficient and low‐cost manner. For this aim, 3D EM model of the proposed design had been used for generating training and validation data sets. Then commonly used state‐of‐the‐art regression algorithms had been used for creating accurate and fast surrogate models to create a mapping between inputs of the model and outputs of the unit element design. After that, Grey Wolf Optimization algorithm had been used for design optimization of a bandpass filter. Then, via the use of 3D printer, the optimally designed filter had been prototyped and its performance characteristics are measured. As a result, by using 3D printer technology, ceramic material, and the proposed method, design optimization of nonuniform nonplanar microstrip filter can be achieved in a computationally efficient way.
... Additive manufacturing (AM) has rapidly expanded threedimensional design space to enable radio frequency (RF) device designs that cannot be produced using conventional manufacturing. This additional degree of processing freedom has been used to additively manufacture a diverse array of RF structures from simple transmission lines [1]- [3], waveguides [4], [5], and patch antennas [6]- [8] to more complex three-dimensional RF filters [9]- [11] and antennas exhibiting unique characteristics [12]- [16] that cannot be achieved in planar configurations alone. Compared to conventional techniques, in which the signal and ground metal must be rolled-on or electrodeposited and subsequently etched, AM uses direct metal deposition to pattern features in a single step. ...
Printed radio frequency (RF) electronic components are often prohibitively lossy due to the materials challenges involved in additively manufacturing metals and dielectrics. We use aerosol jet printing of reactive silver inks to fabricate microstrip transmission lines onto commercial RF boards and subsequently extract the insertion loss of the printed silver through bisect de-embedding of the transmission lines. We directly compare the performance of our printed silver microstrips to conventional copper-clad microstrips to benchmark the efficacy of additive manufacturing against traditional processing methods. With an insertion loss nearing that of conventional copper, reactive silver ink printed traces offer dense continuous metals that can reliably act as conductors for RF applications. In addition to the morphological effects on loss from the printed metal itself, we also observe that the effect of substrate surface texture contributes to unexpected loss that may be mitigated by smoothing the surface or aligning the print direction to minimize these effects. Metallizing passive RF components using reactive inks offers a practical approach which will allow RF designers to take advantage of three-dimensional space. This is possible without sacrificing the necessary high conductivity and low loss needed to produce high performance devices for use within aerospace and communications.
... For polymer matrix composites (PMCs), the type, amount, and distribution of secondary phases in the layers of products can be customized to expand composite applications in electronic, medical, automotive, and aerospace industries. For example, complex antennae structures involving electrical conductors and insulators [1][2][3][4][5][6] can be additively manufactured by devising secondary phases' architecture in composites structure. As other examples, the capacitors applicable in energy storage systems [7,8], or heat-transfer devices [9,10], can be additively manufactured by customizing product composition containing various constituents with various geometrical distributions. ...
The composition variation in composites' structure can be customized to expand their applications for antennae, capacitors, and heat transfer devices. In this study, a fused deposition modeling technique was utilized to customize composition variation in a polylactic acid–copper composite structure. The significant differences in constituents' thermal properties can induce defects and residual stresses, limiting composites' fracture toughness. This property can be improved by post-manufacturing processes such as microwave-assisted heat treatment of composites containing constituents with different dielectric properties. In this work, samples involving a composite part sandwiched between two symmetrical polymer sections were additively manufactured. The composite layers were deposited after selective impregnation of a polylactic acid filament surface with micro-size copper particles. Four sets of manufactured samples were exposed to a 2.45 GHz microwave with 3 kW power for 30, 60, 75, and 90 s. The tensile fracture test results showed that 75 s of exposure improved the interlayer fracture toughness of composites significantly by 37%, the highest among all treatment conditions. Based on microscopy and thermal analysis, it was discussed that decreasing the size of microvoids in the layers, the percentage of polymer crystallinity, and residual stress would benefit fracture toughness of exposed composites.
... [8] The addition of high amount graphite can effectively improve the conductivity and absorbing performance of the material, which is convenient to improve the stealth performance, but the printing material is prone to brittle and difficult to be used as a printing part. [9] In this paper, acetylene black and nylon are used as the main materials to prepare composite powders. ...
In order to meet the requirements of wave-absorbing and stealthy functions, it is necessary to develop high performance absorbing structures and special materials. This paper introduces the performance characterization of the powder mixed with acetylene black and nylon. It characterizes the mixed state, rheological property and the thermal conductivity of the material using optical microscope and rheometer, and thermal analyzer. The experimental results show that when the content is 5% and 7%, the result is the higher melt index, the significantly reduced specific heat capacity and the small printing process window. And the SEM images of the printed parts also show relatively loose structures. Therefore, it is recommended that the content of acetylene black composite powder should not exceed 5%.
... Advancement in printing equipment enables printing microwave devices with complex geometries using a variety of materials. These merits have made 3-D printing an alternative pathway for rapid prototyping of RF and microwave passive components, such as waveguides, 2,3 filters, 4-6 magic-T, 7 antennas, [8][9][10][11][12][13][14] and so on. The three most popular 3-D printing techniques in the microwave field are fused deposition modeling (FDM), stereolighography (SLA) and selective laser sintering or melting (SLS/SLM). ...
In this article, two Ka‐band (26.5‐40 GHz) waveguide attenuators designed for three‐dimensional (3‐D) metal printing are presented. These designs are based on long waveguides with elliptical cross‐sections, so that the waveguide structure can be self‐supported during printing. Bended waveguide and helical waveguide are utilized by the two attenuators, respectively, to achieve reduced overall sizes. The attenuations are fixed, however, these can be altered by varying the length/height of waveguides. The limitation of 3‐D metal printing process on surface roughness is also used to provide attenuation. Therefore, the proposed attenuators can cope with printing process with relatively poor surface finish. The prototype designs are fabricated using a metallic selective laser melting (SLM) process and are measured to have good electrical performance across the full waveguide band. The measured attenuation values are in the range of 3.7 to 6.3 dB for the bended waveguide attenuator and 4.3 to 6.3 dB for the helical waveguide attenuator. Both attenuators are measured to have a good return loss (S11 < −20 dB) across the whole Ka‐band. This demonstrates that 3‐D metal printed attenuators could be an attractive alternative to the conventional designs based on absorbing materials, particularly for applications demanding high powers.
... Following the conductive filaments, two possible solutions available on the market are the Protopasta filament [120], a conductive PLA with a conductivity of σ ≈ 6.67 S/m, and the BlackMagic 3D graphene-enhanced PLA filament [121], with a conductivity of σ ≈ 166 S/m. The authors in [122] selected the Black Magic 3D filament to manufacture a 5.8 GHz patch antenna due to its higher conductivity compared with Protopasta. To build the antenna, a Lulzbot Taz 5 dual print head 3D printer with a printing resolution of 0.1 mm, [123], was used in order to simultaneously print the substrate in PLA and the conductive patch and ground plane of the antenna in BlackMagic. ...
Three-dimensional (3D) printing technology is an area of research that has received great attention in the last decade and it is pointed out by many as the future of manufacturing. 3D printing can be described as an additive process that creates a physical object from a digital model, depositing materials layer by layer. The ability to quickly produce complex structures at a reduced cost and without wasting materials is the main reason why this additive manufacturing technique is increasingly being used instead of conventional manufacturing processes. 3D printing has been applied in several scenarios, including automotive, maritime and construction industry, healthcare, as well as in the antenna research field. This paper reviews the current state-of-the-art of 3D printed antennas. Firstly, an overview of 3D printing technology is presented and then a vast number of 3D printed antennas, categorized by their construction process, are described. Finally, the main advantages and some of the limitations of using 3D printing technology in the construction of Radio Frequency (RF) structures are presented.
A miniaturized sixteenth-mode nanomaterial-based flexible substrate-integrated waveguide (SIW) antenna is demonstrated at an operating frequency of 3.5 GHz. The antenna is designed based on the one-sixteenth mode of a circular SIW cavity. The SIW in this instance is manufactured exclusively with flexible non-textile materials, which makes it unique and novel from the other reported works. The substrate of the proposed antenna is manufactured using PDMS by masking and laser cutting process. The patch on the substrate is made of a 2D nanomaterial MXene, whereas the ground at the bottom is created using copper tape. Vias connecting the patch and ground were filled with silver paste and dried at 80 0C in an oven. With a compact design and flexibility, the proposed flexible SIW antenna offers a unidirectional radiation pattern with a reasonable gain of – 3.39 dBi at a 3.5 GHz resonant frequency. Additionally, the antenna is demonstrated for its flexible performance by straining it to the maximum extent without any structural damage. Consequently, the presented flexible SIW antenna can be well suited for conformal wireless applications.
Antennas play a critical role in modern technology. They are used in various devices and applications, including wireless communication, broadcasting, navigation, military, and space. Overall, the importance of antennas in technology lies in their ability to transmit and receive signals, allowing communication and information transfer across various applications and devices. Three-dimensional printing technology creates antennas using multiple materials, including plastics, metals, and ceramics. Some standard 3D printing techniques used to create antennas include Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM), Stereolithography (SLA), and Selective Laser Sintering (SLS). These antennas can be made in various shapes and sizes. 3D printing can help create complex and customized antenna designs that are difficult or impossible to produce using traditional manufacturing methods. 3D-printing technology has many advantages for building antennas, including customization, ease of fabrication, and cost-effectiveness. This review comprehensively evaluates the usage of 3D-printing technology in antenna fabrication.
