Tissue-Independent Implantable Antenna for In-Body Communications at 2.36 - 2.5 GHz

In this paper, a compact printed meandered folded dipole antenna with a volume of 114mm³ suitable for implantation in a range of different body tissue types with diverse electrical properties is presented for operation in the 2.36 - 2.4 GHz MBAN and 2.4 GHz ISM bands. Its performance was verified and compared against that of a wire dipole and slot loaded monopole antenna in an implant phantom testbed containing tissue equivalent liquids representing body tissues with high and low water content. The antenna was shown to maintain its return loss performance in the 2360 - 2400 MHz, 2400 - 2483.5 MHz and 2483.5 - 2500 MHz frequency bands with equivalent or better performance than a fundamental wire dipole despite having approximately half the physical length.