Session S2C

Antenna Theory Education Tool Using an Interactive

and Movie-based Electronic Book
Jaume Anguera1,2, Member IEEE, Carlos Subas1, Daniel Prez1,
Arnau Cabedo1, Vanessa Jordan1, Juan J. Sorl1, Xavier Carroza1,
1
Albert Miquel , Antonio Prez1, David Badia1, Jordi Margalef3, and Llus Vicent1, Member IEEE
(1)

Communications and Signal Theory Department, Universitat Ramon Llull, Barcelona Spain
Technology and Intellectual Property Rights Department, Fractus, Barcelona Spain
(3)
Electronics Department, Universitat Ramon Llull, Barcelona Spain
{jaumean, jordm, vicent}@salle.url.edu

(2)

Abstract - A virtual tool (electronic book) for antenna

theory and electromagnetic propagation is presented. A
variety of radiation and electromagnetic problems ranging
from linear antennas to arrays, radiation in time domain,
microstrip antennas, smart antennas, and reflectors can be
simulated. The material is useful both at undergraduate
and graduate engineering courses.
The education tool uses a user-friendly interface thanks to
Mathcad software package which has been used to
develop the electronic book. Moreover, navigation
throughout the book follows the same rules used by
internet users, therefore, no extra knowledge have to be
introduced on how to use the present tool. Besides the
user-friendly interface, the book also features visualization
capabilities, 3D representations and videos, which play a
significant role in teaching. The electronic book comes
with several exercise sections having twofold objectives:
first, students can check their own progress, and second,
data from such exercises is provided to professor/mentor.
This data is extremely useful to determine whether a given
section can be considered completely understood or some
extra emphasize needs to be done.
All the material presented in the book can be
complemented by extra peer review scientific papers given
at the end of each section, most of them can be
downloaded (obviously, depending on the contract
between university and editorial).
The book has been tested using objective data resulting in
good acceptance.
Index Terms e-book, antenna-theory education, virtual tool.
engineering education, on-line courses.
INTRODUCTION

Nowadays, fast computers, software packages, and internet are

influencing teaching methods creating new ones such as elabs, on-line education at all levels (undergraduates, masters,
Ph.Ds), among others [1-7]. As a result, several tools are
already being used based on commercial software such as
Mathematica [8], Mathcad [9,10], Matlab [11-13],
Microsoft Excel and spreadsheets [14,15], and other home
mode codes [16,17].
In this paper, an education tool for antenna theory and
electromagnetic propagation is described outlining the main
differences and advantages compared to previous literature.
Based on prior references, the electronic book uses several
well-known features (ex: data visualization using 3D plots and
interactivity) as well as creates new benefits. Briefly, some of
the main features of the electronic book are:
Interactivity. Contrary to a text book, the electronic book
is interactive as the student can change some parameters
of certain equations. Text contents are written accordingly
the interaction capability.
Book scope. Some electronic books using Mathcad
software can be found in the literature [10]. The present
tool is fully dedicated to antennas, at both basic
introductory level and advanced level (Ph.D students).
Exercise section. This is not a common element found in
education tools. Exercise section presents a list of
questions where students can check their progress. At the
same time, results are automatically sent to professor in
charge of the course. Results are useful to determine
progresses.
On-line references. Direct access to international
scientific publications where the student can complement
the basic theory presented in the e-book.

The paper is divided as follows: section previous

experience
shows some preliminary experience with virtual
Telecommunication progresses such as for instance internet,
tools
at
Universitat
Ramon Llull in Barcelona Spain; next
software applications, and real-time video conferences for
section explains the e-book structure and contents; some
example, are changing the human habits; influence at the
examples are given next; section evaluation presents a pilot
university field is not an exception. Two decades ago, printed
test to know the usefulness of the virtual tool; finally section
books were the main source of knowledge in academia.
conclusion presents the concluding remarks.
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October 10 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
S2C-8

Session S2C
PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE

About texts

The starting point is if multimedia materials are better than

classic text contents. Some previous experiments have been
carried out at Universitat Ramon Llull [18]. The participants
in the pilot test were 38 students from the 4th year of
Electrical Engineering. Students did a preliminary test in order
to obtain two groups with the same statistic. After that, both
groups studied for half an hour fundamentals of transmission
lines; the first one (group A) using video-clips of a wave
traveling along a transmission line among other examples; the
other group studied using class book. After that, all the
students perform another test. Results from [18] are
reproduced in table 1.
TABLE 1
RESULTS OF THE TEST
Preliminary test
Second test
Group A Group B Group A Group B
2.35
2.42
5,21
2,73

of the marks
of the marks

2.32

2.19

2,39

2,12

Reference [18] remarks that using a t-student distribution

with different and unknown variances, we obtain the
probability that the level achieved by the students in group A
will not be greater than the level in group B is 0.002 [19].
Therefore, with this objective data, it is shown that video-clips
may be a very interesting tool to be adopted in on-line courses.
Moreover, besides this objective data, some questionnaire was
sent to the students to know their opinion. Results are shown
in Fig.1 and 2. Results reflect that students: a) are satisfied
with video-clip contents; b) video-clip presents an advantage
compare with only text contents; c) however, video contents
are not enough as they should be complemented with text
material.
Do you think students who watched the
video had advantage in understanding the
concepts?

Do you think students who could study

with texts had advantage in
understanding the concepts?

25

20

15

10

I don't agree at all

I don't agree

I don't know

I agree

I totally agree

Less time is required for the understanding of the concepts than with the video
It easily presents in some aspects which are very difficult to understand with the video
It is sufficient to completely understand the concept.
For each competence express what kind of content
would you like to study them with?
Do you think a video like
this is necessary for
learning?

25

20

15

10

No
7%

Much better text

Better text

Better video

Much better video

Problem approaching
Mathematical developments
Physical sense of concepts and formulae

Yes
93%

FIGURE 2
SUBJECTIVE DATA: OPINION OF THE STUDENTS ABOUT TEXT CONTENTS

Triggered by these results, the electronic book for antenna

theory and electromagnetic propagation has been designed
taking into account this data, that is, video-clip material
contents. Several examples are shown in section examples.
E-BOOK STRUCUTRE AND CONTENTS
The book contents structured in 8 chapters is dedicated to
antenna theory and electromagnetic propagation at
undergraduate and graduate level [20]. At the same time, each
chapter is divided in several sections where the working
experiments take place (Fig.3).

Yes
18%

No
10%

No
82%

Yes
90%

About the video

20
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0

I don't agree at all

I don't agree

I don't know

I agree

I totally agree

Less time is required for the understanding of the concepts than with texts
It easily presents some aspects which are very difficult to understand with texts
It is sufficient to completely understand the concept

FIGURE 1
SUBJECTIVE DATA: OPINION OF THE STUDENTS ABOUT VIDEO-CLIP CONTENTS

FIGURE 3
E-BOOK GENERAL STRUCTURE: TITLE, CHAPTERS, SECTION (THEORY AND
EXERCISES), AND REFERENCES. ARROW 1: LINK BETWEEN CHAPTERS. ARROW
2: LINK TO REFERENCES

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October 10 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
S2C-9

Session S2C
At the present stage, the tool is used at
Telecommunication and Electronic Engineering degree at
Universitat Ramon Llull in Barcelona Spain.
In Fig.3, title part contents the title, authors as well as the
sponsors. By a single clicking, one can access the chapter
index (Fig.4). Title is an .hbk file (handbook): this file
contents a pointer to each chapter. Chapter index (Fig.4)
shows the chapters where a single click moves the student to
the desired one.

Once the student chooses one chapter, a new window

shows the sections. Each section is a Mathcad sheet (.mcd
file) as it is shown in Fig.5. Therefore, the lowest entity is a
section, i.e., section does not contain more subsections. For an
e-book, reading becomes difficult if one increases the number
of subdivisions (subsection, sub-subsections ). An example
of section index is shown in Fig.5. In Fig.5 a rectangle shows
the navigation tool which is the same as that used in internet,
that is, direct access to previous section
I. Details on Section part
As section is where the working area takes place, this section
explains some details and shows some examples on how a
section is structured. At the end, comments on a special
section called exercises are discussed.
As it has been explained before, student can reach the
desired section from the section index (Fig. 5). For example,
section wave propagating in free-space is a single Mathcad
file. Each section follows the same structure, namely: section
title, introduction, scenario, conclusions, and references
(Fig.6).

FIGURE 4
CHAPTER INDEX: A SINGLE CLICK OPENS THE CHAPTER MATERIAL DIVIDED IN
SEVERAL SECTIONS

FIGURE 5
SECTION INDEX: A SINGLE CLICK OPEN THE SECTION MATERIAL

FIGURE 6
EACH SECTION IS DIVIDED INTO 5 PARTS: TITLE SECTION, SOME
INTRODUCTION, SCENARIO WHERE STUDENT MAY CHANGE PARAMETERS
(INTERACTIVITY) AND OBSERVE MULTIMEDIA FILES, CONCLUSIONS POINT OUT
MAIN REMARKS, AND REFERENCES ARE USED FOR EXTRA KNOWLEDGE.

Introduction explains what the general contents of the

whole section are; scenario shows the working student area:
equations which may be changed, videos, and guiding
comments. Conclusions point out the more relevant
discussions. Finally, references include links to word-files,
public pdf files or even internet access (see arrow (2) in Fig.3).
The scenario part presents case study, equations, plots,
and multimedia files such as videos. In the scenario one can
distinguish two main differences compared to a classic text
book: one is interactivity; the other is the existence of
multimedia files. Interactivity: student can change certain
equation parameters and observe results in a plot. When an
equation may be changed, the parameters are marked with
green color. A range of realistic values is attached near the
interactivity parameters. An example of interactivity: how a
radiation pattern changes as a function of the antenna
electrical size and its distance to a groundplane. Thus, student
can change some parameters in an equation to analyze the
results.

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October 10 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
S2C-10

Session S2C
Interactivity forces the book designer to write the book in
a special way, i.e., text must contain comments to guide
student to test realistic examples to avoid trial-and-error
experiments. In the book, these kind of comments are called
guiding comments. An example is given next:
For a broadside array, directivity reaches the maximum
when element spacing in near one wavelength (it has to
be less than one wavelength to avoid grating lobes to be
in the visible range). Analyze directivity as well as
grating lobes when increasing inter-element spacing
With guiding comments, the trial-space is bounded and
provides also a correct path to test useful experiments.
Therefore, interactivity is a great advantage but one has to
take care when writing the book in order to avoid a wide range
of changes. If interactivity is not controlled by guiding
comments, then, student may start to try-and-error hundreds of
no-sense experiments.
Fig.7 shows an example of interactivity: equations used to
calculate the radiation pattern of a rectangular patch for any
TMmn mode are shown. For this particular case, student can
choose the mode order as well as patch dimensions and
dielectric constant. Mathcad automatically calculates
resonant frequency, field distribution within the cavity,
radiation pattern as well as directivity. Guiding comments
guide the student to test interesting cases. Those parameters
that are susceptible of changes are marked with green color as
shown in Fig.7 (dark area).

Mathcad software, it is easy to have a dynamic caption also,

that is, caption changes depending on the interaction area. In
Fig.8, dark areas mean that they are dynamic captions.

FIGURE 8
EXAMPLE OF MICROSTRIP ANTENNA DESIGN SECTION: PLOTS AND FIGURE
CAPTION CHANGE ACCORDING TO THE USER INTERACTION

The other main advantage is the existence of multimedia

files such a videos of wave propagation. This point is not only
interesting to motivate student but also to give a more physical
insight of some problems that are rather difficult using
mathematical procedures. In this sense, the mathematical
procedure can be better understood when videos are used. For
example, Fig.9 shows power propagation at four different
times of a four array of radiating sources excited with the
same amplitude and phase (uniform case). It is shown how the
radiation starts and after enough time (steady regime) and far
away from the source (far field), one can observe the radiation
pattern.

FIGURE 7
INTERACTIVE AREA: PARAMETERS THAT MAY BE CHANGED ARE MARKED
WITH GREEN COLOUR. BESIDE THE PARAMETERS THAT STUDENT MAY
CHANGE, A RANGE OF REALISTIC VALUES ARE SHOWN.
FIGURE 9

Fig. 8 shows an example of the electrical field inside the

RADIATION OF A 2D ELECTROMAGNETIC TM WAVE GENERATED BY 4 UNIFORM
SOURCES SPACED HALF THE WAVELENGTH. FREQUENCY OF OPERATION IS
cavity patch. Data changes according to the user interaction
1.5GHZ. SIMULATIONS DONE USING A HOME-MADE FDTD CODE
(dark rectangles shown in Fig.7). Moreover, using the
1-4244-1084-3/07/$25.00 2007 IEEE
October 10 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
S2C-11

Session S2C
Using this kind of videos in the classroom, makes the
student more motivated and helps them to understand the
basic antenna theory and the physics of electromagnetics
E-BOOK EXAMPLES
To have a more general idea of the e-book contents some
examples are shown next.
Fig.10 shows an example of array antenna theory. Student
may change number of elements, distanced between them,
excitation (amplitude and phase or each element) as well as
the direction of maximum radiation. Results are: radiation
pattern both in 2D and 3D as well as directivity. The example
shown in Fig.10 compares three canonic amplitude
excitations: uniform, triangular, and binomial. Student can
change the number of elements and distances. Based on these
results, the student is able to determine what the advantages of
changing the amplitude taper are. Guiding comments helps the
students to test some representative examples.

FIGURE 11
EXAMPLE OF CHAPTER 5. A REFLECTOR ANTENNA FED BY AN IDEAL SOURCE IS
ANALYZED USING BOTH IMAGE THEORY AND FDTD SIMULATION. THIS SECTION
SHOWS A MOVIE OF THE RADIATION PRODUCED WHEN THE SOURCE IS EXCITED
USING AN ARMONIC SIGNAL. THEN, RADIATION FIELD IS CALCULATED USING
IMAGE THEORY AND RESULTS ARE COMPARED WITH THOSE OBTAINED BY
SAMPLING THE FAR-FIELD GIVEN BY FDTD SIMULATION

FIGURE 10
EXAMPLE OF CHAPTER 2. 3D PLOTS RADIATION PATTERN OF ANTENNA
ARRAYS HAVING DIFFERENT AMPLITUDE DISTRIBUTION

Fig.11 shows an example of chapter 5 dealing with

reflector antennas. In this particular case, a reflector antenna
fed by a point source is analyzed using both image theory and
the FDTD (Finite Difference Time Domain) method. A movie
shows how the point source is radiating and how the reflector
shapes the radiation. Radiation patterns are shown for both
methods, the image theory and FDTD. Therefore, student may
see what the potential of an easy tool (image theory) is in
order to give a physical insight into the behavior of some
radiation problems, in this case for a radiation of a point
source combined with a planar reflector. Student may change
the location of the point source as well as the apex angle of the
reflector. This way, student may relate how these parameters
affect the radiation performance of this kind of antenna.
In Fig.12 a section of chapter 6 is shown. This chapter
combines signal-processing and antenna theory concepts.
Student may experiment with different antenna configuration
and method of signal detection, direction of arrival, and beamforming schemes.

FIGURE 12
EXAMPLE OF CHAPTER 6 SHOWING THREE DIFFERENT METHODS OF DOA
(DIRECTION OF ARRIVAL). SEVERAL GUIDE COMMENTS SHOW THE STUDENT
HOW THE BEHAVIOUR IS RELATED WITH ANTENNA DESIGN

E-BOOK EVALUATION
The academic year 2004-2005 has been the starting point to
use the e-book. Subjective comments have been received from
the students. However, to evaluate even more the book utility,
the following objective experiment has been carried out:
A pre-test on general antenna theory with 30
undergraduate students. Test consists of 10 questions:

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October 10 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
S2C-12

Session S2C

correct one scores 1 point while a not correct answer

scores -0.5 points.
Once the pre-test is corrected, the 30 student are divided
into 2 groups of 15 students, being these 2 groups (group
A and B) statistically very similar in terms of scores:
similar mean and deviation. From a list from the best to
the worst case, one starts from top, select the first best
student to the group A, and the second to the group B and
so on.
Groups A and B are separated into different classrooms.
For 1 hour students are studying one particular topic in
antenna theory. Group A uses the e-book while group B
the class-notes.
After 1 hour a new test on the topic studied before is
done. Same exam for both groups is used.

of the marks
of the marks

TABLE 2
RESULTS OF THE TEST
Preliminary test
Second test
Group A Group B Group A Group B
3.73
3.43
5.96
4.23
1.69

1.70

2.47

2.12

It is shown in Error! Reference source not found. that

group A, the one using the e-book, have performed better for
the final-test. Obviously, from only one experiment, one can
not take general conclusions but at least this result motivates
our group for further revisions and updates with new material.
In the hypothesis test we obtain a Z of 1.87, which
indicates that the probability of mistake if we assume that
results of students are better if they study over the e-book is
0.035, lower than the 5% that it is normally accepted to accept
an hypothesis.
CONCLUSIONS
We have presented an e-book for antenna theory,
electromagnetic radiation and propagation based on Mathcad
software. The e-book takes advantage of hypertext,
interactivity and multimedia files to enhance comprehension
and motivate the student.
The e-book contents and structure have been presented:
eight chapters for undergraduate and graduate level.
The e-book has been objectively tested where results
encourage for further improvement of the present edition. The
e-book seems not only interesting for students but also for
professors to explain certain topics with some images and
videos which may enhance comprehension.
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October 10 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
S2C-13