Multiferroic Small Antenna

ABSTRACT: PaneraTech, in partnership with UCLA, is proposing to develop an extremely small UHF antenna based on Multiferroics. The Multiferroic (MF) concept allows for a sub-wavelength (<lambda/100) conformal antenna design which also offers benefits to a wide range of military platforms, such as small Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) and lightweight portable ground based communications systems, which require operational capability in the VHF and UHF frequency range. The team leverages UCLA's years of research in Multiferroic systems and will primarily focus on design and analytical modeling of a UHF multiferroic antenna and demonstrate its performance with hardware prototype. BENEFIT: This technology has a tremendous potential for both military and commercial platforms. Current antenna designs rely primarily on the electromagnetic resonance characteristic of an electrically conductive antenna structure. This results in large antenna sizes and makes communication and SIGINT capability at VHF and UHF frequencies challenging for a wide range of platforms, but most notably small UAS systems. Our proposed Multiferroic based small antenna technology allows for integrating extremely small antennas on UAS airframe for VHF and UHF applications.