Background Art Wireless terminals, such as mobile phone handsets, typically incorporate either an external antenna, such as a normal mode helix or meander line antenna, or an internal antenna, such as a Planar Inverted-F Antenna (PIFA) or similar.

Such antennas are small (relative to a wavelength) and therefore, owing to the fundamental limits of small antennas, narrowband. However, cellular radio communication systems typically have a fractional bandwidth of 10% or more. To achieve such a bandwidth from a PIFA for example requires a considerable volume, there being a direct relationship between the bandwidth of a patch antenna and its volume, but such a volume is not readily available with the current trends towards small handsets. Further, PIFAs become reactive at resonance as the patch height is increased, which is necessary to improve bandwidth.

A PIFA intended for use in a dual-band application typically comprises two resonators with a common feed point. An example of such an antenna is disclosed in European patent application EP 0,997,974, in which two PIFA antennas are fed from a common point and share a common shorting pin.

However, use of multiple resonators further increases the antenna volume.

Disclosure of Invention An object of the present invention is to provide a planar antenna arrangement requiring a substantially smaller volume than known PIFAs while providing similar dual-band or multi-band performance.

According to a first aspect of the present invention there is provided an antenna arrangement comprising a substantially planar patch conductor

supported substantially parallel to a ground plane and a feed conductor connected to the patch conductor, wherein the patch conductor is electrically insulated from the ground plane at operational frequencies of the antenna arrangement and wherein the feed conductor is coupled to a matching network arranged to provide a match to the antenna at a plurality of discrete frequencies.

Such an antenna arrangement differs from a conventional PIFA in that there is no grounding conductor connected between the patch conductor and the ground plane. By eliminating this grounding conductor and performing dual-band (or multi-band) matching with external circuitry, a better match can be achieved over a wide range of frequencies, enabling similar performance to conventional PIFA antennas to be achieved from a reduced volume and with a less complex antenna.

According to a second aspect of the present invention there is provided a radio communications apparatus including an antenna arrangement made in accordance with the present invention.

The present invention is based upon the recognition, not present in the prior art, that by eliminating the grounding pin from a PIFA and making use of a separate multi-band matching network, a significantly reduced antenna volume is possible.

Brief Description of Drawings Embodiments of the present invention will now be described, by way of example, with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein: Figure 1 is a perspective view of a Planar Inverted L Antenna (PILA) mounted on a handset; Figure 2 is a graph of simulated return loss Sll in dB against frequency f in MHz for the PILA of Figure 1 without matching; Figure 3 is a Smith chart showing the simulated impedance of the PILA of Figure 1 over the frequency range 800 to 3000MHz ; Figure 4 is a graph of return loss SI, in dB against frequency f in MHz for the PILA of Figure 1 driven via a shunt LC resonant circuit;

Figure 5 is a Smith chart showing the impedance of the PILA of Figure 1 driven via a shunt LC resonant circuit over the frequency range 800 to 3000MHz ; Figure 6 is a circuit diagram of a dual-band matching circuit; Figure 7 is a graph of simulated return loss Sil in dB against frequency f in MHz for the PILA of Figure 1 driven via the matching circuit of Figure 6; Figure 8 is a Smith chart showing the simulated impedance of the PILA of Figure 1 over the frequency range 800 to 3000MHz driven via the matching circuit of Figure 6; Figure 9 is a circuit diagram of a five-band matching network for UMTS, DCS1800 and GSM ; Figure 10 is a graph of simulated return loss Sll in dB against frequency f in MHz for the PILA of Figure 1 driven via the UMTS matching circuit of Figure 9; Figure 11 is a Smith chart showing the simulated impedance of the PILA of Figure 1 over the frequency range 800 to 3000MHz driven via the UMTS matching circuit of Figure 9; Figure 12 is a graph of simulated return loss SI, in dB against frequency f in MHz for the PILA of Figure 1 driven via the GSM Tx matching circuit of Figure 9; Figure 13 is a Smith chart showing the simulated impedance of the PILA of Figure 1 over the frequency range 800 to 3000MHz driven via the GSM Tx matching circuit of Figure 9; In the drawings the same reference numerals have been used to indicate corresponding features.

Modes for Carrying Out the Invention A perspective view of a Planar Inverted L Antenna (PILA) mounted on a handset is shown in Figure 1. The PILA comprises a rectangular patch conductor 102 supported parallel to a ground plane 104 forming part of the handset. The antenna is fed via a feed pin 106. Such an antenna differs from a PIFA in that there is no additional shorting pin connecting the patch conductor 102 to the ground plane 104.

In a PIFA the shorting pin performs a matching function, but this match is only effective at one frequency and is at the expense of the match at other frequencies. Our co-pending unpublished United Kingdom patent application GB0101667. 4 (Applicant's reference PHGB010009) shows how the shorting and feed pins of a conventional PIFA form a short circuit transmission line in differential mode (with oppositely-directed currents on each pin). This transmission line performs a matching function (shunt reactance). An upward impedance transformation is also performed in the common mode. However, the matching produced is not optimal for dual-band (or multi-band) applications and a better match can generally be produced using discrete components.

In an example embodiment of a PILA for use in GSM and DCS frequency bands, the patch conductor 102 has dimensions 20x10mm and is located 8mm above the ground plane 104 which measures 40x100x1mm The feed pin 106 is located at a corner of both the patch conductor 102 and ground plane 104.

The return loss S1 1 of this embodiment (without matching) was simulated using the High Frequency Structure Simulator (HFSS), available from Ansoft Corporation, with the results shown in Figure 2 for frequencies f between 800 and 3000MHz. A Smith chart illustrating the simulated impedance of this embodiment over the same frequency range is shown in Figure 3. The response is capacitive at low frequencies and inductive at high frequencies. The resistance only varies between 10 and 30Q over the entire frequency range, due largely to the influence of the ground plane 104.

This impedance characteristic makes it straightforward to apply wideband matching using a shunt LC resonant circuit connected between the feed pin 106 and ground plane 104. Simulations of the PILA shown in Figure 1 fed via such a resonant circuit were performed, using an inductance of 1nH and a capacitance of 8pF, both assumed to have a constant Q of 50. Results for return loss Sil are shown in Figure 4 and a Smith chart is shown in Figure 5, in both cases for frequencies f between 800 and 3000MHz. It is clear that the LC resonant circuit provides a wideband/dual-band response with a greatly improved the antenna bandwidth.

However, the simple shunt LC matching is clearly not optimal, and could be further improved by a range of measures, including: changing the dimensions of the patch conductor 102 or ground plane 104; adding a series LC resonator; and adding a more conventional L, n or T matching circuit.

Use of all of these measures will be familiar to those skilled in the art.

The PILA structure is also amenable to being fed via a dual-band matching circuit. An example of a suitable circuit for GSM and DCS1800 applications is shown in Figure 6, where the components used have the following values : Ci is 1.2pF; Li is 6.5nH; C2 is 3pF and L2 is 6.9nH. In use, the matching circuit is fed from a 500 source across connections Pi and P2, P3 is connected to the feed pin 106 and P4 is connected to the ground plane 104.

Simulations of the PILA shown in Figure 1 fed via such the dual-band matching circuit shown in Figure 6 were performed. Results for return loss Sll are shown in Figure 7 and a Smith chart is shown in Figure 8, in both cases for frequencies f between 800 and 3000MHz. The two resonances are centred on 920MHz, with a 3dB bandwidth of 120MHz, and 1810MHz, with a 3dB bandwidth of 350MHZ. This performance is close to that of conventional dual- band PIFA structure. However, such a conventional dual-band PIFA would typically have dimensions of 30x30x8mm, generating a volume of 7200mm3, which is more than four times the 1600mm3 volume of the PILA of Figure 1.

The efficiency of the antenna, assuming each of the matching circuit components to have a Q of 50, is 40% for GSM and 70% for DCS. Again, this is close to the typical efficiency of conventional PIFA designs. It will be apparent that the return loss and efficiency could be optimised further.

A further embodiment demonstrates the wide applicability of an antenna arrangement made in accordance with the present invention. A PILA having the same dimensions as that shown in Figure 1 is driven via a switched five- band matching circuit, shown in Figure 9. Such a multiplexer circuit is based on one disclosed in our co-pending unpublished International patent application PCT/EP01/06760 (Applicant's reference PHGB000083). It comprises an output 902 for coupling RF signals to the feed pin 106 and a

five-way switch 904 for selecting an input source. There are six inputs: UMTS receive 906 and transmit 908; DCS receive 910; DCS transmit 912; GSM receive 914; and GSM transmit 916.

UMTS signals are fed via a diplexer 918 (to permit frequency division duplex operation) and a matching network comprising a 1.5pF capacitor Ci.

The component values in the other arms of the matching network are: C2 is 1.4pF; Li is 0.75nH; L2 is 10nH ; L3 is 14nH; L4 is 13nH; Ls is 10nH ; and C3 is 0.75pF. The matching for UMTS was designed for a 50Q system, while that GSM and DCS transmit was designed for 10Q and that for GSM and DCS receive for 250Q. This demonstrates a particular advantage of such a multiplexer arrangement: individual matching of both frequency and impedance characteristics for each band is possible, enabling significantly optimised performance.

Simulations of the PILA of Figure 1 fed via the five-band matching circuit of Figure 9 were performed. For these, the switch 904 was modelled as five resistors: a 2.250 resistor to the selected branch (equivalent to 0.2dB in a 50Q system) and a 50kQ resistor to the other branches (equivalent to 30dB in a 50Q system). Switches of this quality should be easily achievable with Micro ElectroMagnetic Systems (MEMS).

Simulated results for return loss Sll for frequencies f between 800 and 3000MHz are shown in Figure 10 for the UMTS branch, together with a Smith chart of impedance over the same frequency range in Figure 11, and in Figure 12 for the GSM transmit branch, together with a Smith chart in Figure 13.

Results for all the branches are summarised by the following table : Band Frequency (MHz) Bandwidth Efficiency Isolation UMTS 1900-2170 6dB 65% 60dB DCS Rx 1805-1880 10dB 60% 50dB DCS Tx 1710-1785 10dB 70% 50dB GSM Rx 935-960 10dB 60% 40dB GSM Tx 890-915 10dB 50% 40dB

In this table, bandwidth indicates the (negative of the) maximum value of SI, over the particular frequency band. The bandwidths are all quite acceptable, as are the efficiencies. The isolation figures indicate that the mulitplexer network provides additional isolation over that provided by the switch 904, which may be useful in many embodiments.

This embodiment demonstrates that a very compact PILA together with a multi-band matching network can provide very good performance over a range of communication bands at different frequencies.

Although in the embodiments discussed above all of the matching components were external to the antenna, some of the matching function could be performed on the antenna structure itself, for example making use of a low loss substrate supporting the antenna. This could enable inclusion of higher Q inductors, for example.

From reading the present disclosure, other modifications will be apparent to persons skilled in the art. Such modifications may involve other features which are already known in the design, manufacture and use of antenna arrangements and component parts thereof, and which may be used instead of or in addition to features already described herein.

In the present specification and claims the word"a"or"an"preceding an element does not exclude the presence of a plurality of such elements.

Further, the word"comprising"does not exclude the presence of other elements or steps than those listed.