Handset antenna array to mitigate the finger loading effect

Abstract

The effect of the human hand over the electromagnetic behavior of handset antennas is an important aspect that should be taken into account. In this r egard, the finger loading is a critical issue since it may det une the input impedance as well as decrease the efficiency. To ov ercome such effects, an array of several small handset antennas is proposed, in particular, an array of two elements and other with three elements distributed along the ground plane of a ha ndset wireless device. The finger loading effect over several posi tions is experimentally analyzed using a phantom hand in the 824- 960MHz frequency region where several communication s standards are allocated (e.g. GSM850 and GSM900). T he experiments reveal that the array with three elemen ts presents higher robustness to the finger loading effect fulf illing, at the same time, the size constraints imposed by handset platforms.