Sub-6 GHz Beam-Reconfigurable Microfluidic Antenna Using Graphene Liquid for 5G Network

As wireless communication systems continue to grow rapidly, high-performance antennas become increasingly crucial for expanding coverage, improving capacity, and enhancing transmission quality. In light of this, research has focused considerable attention on liquid antennas due to their unique characteristics, which include small size, flexibility, reconfigurability and transparency. Recently, graphene liquid has been explored for numerous applications due to its low cost, high conductivity, flexibility, and ease of processing. Specifically for antenna applications, graphene liquid performs better than conventional liquid metal. This paper presents a graphene-liquid antenna with beam reconfiguration ability for sub-6 GHz communication system. The graphene-liquid movement within the microfluidic channel is taken into consideration by the reconfiguration mechanism. The antenna achieves beam reconfiguration in 360° directions with 6 dBi of gain at 5.5 GHz, featuring a wideband impedance bandwidth of 24%. The antenna main beam is specifically reconfigured into six directions (0°, 45°, 135°, 180°, 225° and 315°) at 5.5 GHz. Additionally, in all six reconfigurable scenarios at 5.5 GHz, the antenna provides a stable reflection coefficient. Therefore, for the next generation of wireless communication systems, this novel design of graphene-liquid-based reconfigurable sub-6 GHz antennas holds promise.