434

IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL. 14, 2015

High-Gain S-band Patch Antenna System for

Earth-Observation CubeSat Satellites
Augusto Nascetti, Member, IEEE, Erika Pittella, Paolo Teofilatto, and Stefano Pisa, Member, IEEE

AbstractA novel S-band circularly polarized patch antenna

system suited for earth-observing CubeSats is presented. The
antenna consists of four rectangular patches properly excited
in order to have the maximum gain in the boresight direction
and produce circular polarization. The antenna has a compact
size, and its geometry and characteristics are compatible with
any CubeSat standard structure. A 57-mm-wide square window
allows to accommodate imaging system optics in its center leading
to a very compact overall system. A prototype of the designed
antenna system has been used to validate simulation results that
showed a gain of 7.3 dBi. Experimental measurements confirm
that the antenna achieves good impedance match at the desired
frequency of 2450 MHz, a directivity of 8.3 dBi, and
3-dB
beamwidth, in good agreement with the simulation results.
Index TermsCubeSat, high gain, patch antennas, S-band,
small satellites.

I. INTRODUCTION

PACE missions based on CubeSat are today continuously

increasing [1]. Indeed, this class of nanosatellites is particularly attractive because it enables access to the space at low
cost, allowing small countries, universities, or even minor private companies to gain experience in the aerospace sector. In
addition, thanks to the modern technologies, relatively complex
missions can be planned, e.g., for earth observation [2], remote
sensing [3], communication technology experiments [4], hardware validation, and other scientific missions as well as educational purposes [5], [6].
Even in case of minor projects, every satellite must satisfy
strict requirements not only to ensure successful operation in
the harsh space environment, but also to comply with safety
requirements imposed by the launcher company or organization. In the case of CubeSats, they also have to comply with
the CubeSat standard [5] that imposes stringent limitations to
satellite dimensions and weight, which makes the design of
each subsystem a challenge. This holds in particular for all
the mission-specific aspects since for those parts, typically,
no standard solution is commercially available, as instead is
Manuscript received July 24, 2014; revised September 05, 2014 and October
07, 2014; accepted October 26, 2014. Date of publication November 03, 2014;
date of current version February 05, 2015.
A. Nascetti and P. Teofilatto are with the Department of Astronautical, Electrical and Energy Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, 00138 Rome, Italy
(e-mail: augusto.nascetti@uniroma1.it; paolo.teofilatto@uniroma1.it).
E. Pittella and S. Pisa are with the Department of Information, Electronics
and Communication Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, 00184 Rome,
Italy (e-mail: pittella@diet.uniroma1.it; pisa@die.uniroma1.it).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this letter are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LAWP.2014.2366791

the case for the satellite-bus subsystems such as on-board

computer, electrical power subsystem, and radio. One of the
key components of each satellite is the communication subsystem as it ensures the link with the ground station for the
uplink of telecommands and the downlink of telemetry and
payload data. In particular, the design of the antenna system
is a fundamental step as it must take into account mission
aspects (e.g., satellite attitude) and comply with the CubeSat
size constraints, while, of course, ensuring good performances.
Typically, CubeSats rely on VHF/UHF communication systems
with deployable monopole or dipole antennas for low bit-rate
uplink and downlink (telecommands and telemetry) while, for
high bit rates, S-band is among the favorite choices as the range
24002450 MHz is one of the International amateur satellite
frequency ranges allocated by the International Telecommunication Union [7].
One of the most frequent high-bit-rate payloads is that of
cameras or other remote sensing systems like spectrometers.
This kind of payload impacts on many satellite aspects, making
its design more complex due to the size and weight limitations
of the CubeSat standard and the consequent limits on power
budget. However, some aspects can also be favorably used as
an advantage in the design of the antenna system: For example,
the need of a nadir pointing attitude for earth observation can
be exploited by using high-gain directive antennas and therefore employing lower transmitting power to achieve the same
link performances.
Starting from a practical case, namely the design of the
Tigrisat satellite, a patch antenna has been designed that combines several advantages making it a suitable general solution
for earth-observing CubeSat missions. Tigrisat is a 3U CubeSat,
i.e., three times the basic CubeSat unit (1U is a cube of 10 cm
side) with a mission of dust storms detection over Iraq. Tigrisat
has been developed at the School of Aerospace Engineering,
Sapienza University of Rome, Italy, within an international
collaboration between Italy and the Republic of Iraq and has
been successfully launched on June 19, 2014, from the Yasni
cosmodrome in Russia.
II. SYSTEM DESIGN
In Fig. 1, a photograph of the Tigrisat satellite taken during
the assembling phase is shown as a reference to illustrate the position of the camera and the constraints adopted for the design
of the S-band antenna system. The basic idea is to use the small
-cm face for the payload in order not to sacrifice the
large faces (
cm , in case of a 3U structure as the one
of Tigrisat) that can be more efficiently employed for hosting
solar panels for energy production. In such a configuration, the

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NASCETTI et al.: HIGH-GAIN S-BAND PATCH ANTENNA SYSTEM FOR EARTH-OBSERVATION CUBESAT SATELLITES

435

Fig. 1. Photograph of the Tigrisat satellite during the assembling phase (prior
to the mounting of the side solar panels), showing the camera position. In particular, the figure shows the bottom side of the satellite with the camera lens
going through the central hole of the S-band antenna.

nadir pointing attitude needed for earth imaging will correspond

to the major axis of the satellite aligned with the local vertical
direction. In this case, the attitude control system may also take
advantage of the gravity gradient component that can contribute
to satellite stabilization. As a consequence of the proposed payload arrangement, the bottom face must have a window for the
imaging hardware. On the other hand, from the considerations
made in Section I, having nadir pointing attitude and, typically,
a limited power budget, it makes sense to use a directive antenna
for more efficient data downlink. Taking into account the overall
size and weight constraints imposed by the CubeSat standard,
printed patch antennas are the best candidate for this subsystem.
According to these considerations, the space available for the
patch antenna on the bottom face is that indicated in Fig. 2, i.e.,
a square annular ring with external side of 96 mm and internal
side of 57 mm, which is the size of the hole for the camera optics.
Taking into account the geometrical constraints mentioned
above, a rectangular patch geometry is chosen for the design
of the antenna system as shown in Fig. 2. Rogers RT5870 (
,
, and
mm) has been considered
as substrate material because of its high reliability characteristics for aerospace applications [8]. With such a substrate, the dimensions of a single patch have been computed first analytically
by using the formulas in [9], and then have been optimized for
operation at 2.45 GHz with the electromagnetic (EM) computeraided design (CAD) Microwave Studio (MWS) by Computer
Simulation Technology (CST). The final dimensions are
mm and
mm. In order to achieve the best matching,
it has been found from the simulations that the feeding point of
the single patch has to be placed 3 mm away from the antenna
center. In this configuration, the maximum gain of the single
patch is 5.9 dBi, and the
value is 15.05 dB at the operational frequency of 2.45 GHz.
In a second phase, the whole array geometry has been designed by arranging four identical patches on the four sides of
the square annular ring (Fig. 2). By changing the phase of the
feeding signals, different radiation patterns and different polarization can be achieved. In this work, considering the feeding

Fig. 2. Scheme of the proposed antenna geometry with quotes and indication
of the feeding phases. Ports A and C are fed in phase, while ports B and D have
phase difference with respect to ports A and C.
a

point positions indicated in Fig. 2, a

phase difference between the two orthogonal pairs of patches results in a bore-side
main-lobe radiation pattern with circular polarization.
In order to feed the antenna as previously described, a power
divider in microstrip technology has been designed using the
Wilkinson structure that allows a high isolation between the
output ports while maintaining a matched condition on all
ports [10]. It uses quarter-wave transformers, which can be
easily fabricated on printed circuit boards. In particular, the
input power is equally divided among the four antennas by
using three power dividers. The value of the resistors of the
three Wilkinson dividers is 100 . Concerning phase relationships, the signals at the antenna feeding points A and C (Fig. 2)
are in phase, while to the feeding points B and D, the signals
have a phase difference of
with respect to A and C ports.
This has been obtained by adding two delay lines before ports 1
and 3.
For the design of the feeding line, the circuital CAD Microwave Office (MWO, El Segundo, CA, USA) based on the
harmonic balance analysis is widely used for steady-state simulation of nonlinear microwave circuits.
Then, taking into account the geometrical constraints, the circuit layout has been designed on a second Rogers RT5870 substrate with
,
, and
mm using
the opposite face of the substrate as ground plane.
The patch radiators and the feeding transmission line have
been patterned by conventional photolithography process on
two Rogers RT5870 substrates of 1.52 and 0.508 mm thickness, respectively. On the ground-plane side of both substrates, a
clearance area with radius of 2 mm has been defined around each
of the via holes that feed the patches. The final antenna system
has been then achieved by assembling the two Rogers substrates
in a single structure. This has been done by connecting together

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IEEE ANTENNAS AND WIRELESS PROPAGATION LETTERS, VOL. 14, 2015

Fig. 4. Simulated (dashed line) and measured (full line) reflection coefficient
of the whole structure, feed-line plus radiators seen at the coaxial input.

enclosure equal to
m . The internal side walls
and ceiling are entirely covered by TDK IB-011 ferrite tiles in
order to absorb the incident radiation up to 1 GHz. The operative range of the chamber is extended up to 18 GHz by means
of ultrawideband TDK IP-045C pyramidal absorbers installed
on the central spots of the side walls and the ceiling. Moreover,
some extra pyramidal absorbers have been placed close to
the antenna, and their position has been optimized during a
series of preliminary tests in order to minimize background
reflections. All the measurements have been performed with
the antenna mounted on the satellite structure.
A. Return Loss

Fig. 3. Top (radiators) and bottom (feed line) view and layer stackup of the
fabricated antenna.

the two ground planes using an electrical conductive glue and

connecting the feed-line terminations to the patch feed-point
with metallic pins inserted in the via-holes. The layer stackup
as well as top and bottom view of the fabricated prototype are
shown in Fig. 3.
III. RESULTS
Numerical EM simulations have been conducted taking into
account the whole structure previously described. Moreover, the
model of the SMA connector, located on the bottom layer, has
been also considered.
To experimentally test the path antenna system, measurements on the realized prototype have been also conducted in
an anechoic chamber, with external dimensions of the shielded

Fig. 4 shows the return-loss magnitude as a function of the

frequency for the designed S-band patch antenna system. In particular, the figure shows the
results obtained by means of
EM numerical simulations, computed with MWS, and by measurements, performed by using a Rohde & Schwarz ZVB20
vector network analyzer (VNA). The VNA is placed outside
the anechoic chamber and connected to the antenna by means
of low-loss coaxial cables.
Both simulations (dashed line) and experimental (full line)
results highlight that the antenna is well matched at the desired operational frequency, satisfying the requirement on the
that is well below the value of 10 dB at 2.45 GHz. Moreover, the measured
frequency behavior is in a very good
agreement with simulation results.
B. Radiation pattern
Concerning the antenna radiation pattern, Fig. 5 shows a 3-D
plot of the simulated antenna far field at 2.45 GHz. The figure
highlights that the direction of maximum radiation is along to
the boresight direction with a 3-dB aperture of about
and a directivity main-lobe magnitude of 8.3 dBi. The maximum
gain is 7.3 dBi, while the axial-ratio values at the operational
frequency are close to 1 and a phase difference close to
,
pointing out that the designed antenna system exhibits a circular
polarization.

NASCETTI et al.: HIGH-GAIN S-BAND PATCH ANTENNA SYSTEM FOR EARTH-OBSERVATION CUBESAT SATELLITES

437

IV. CONCLUSION

Fig. 5. 3-D plot of the simulated directivity radiation pattern.

The design and the realization of a novel high-gain S-band

circularly polarized patch antenna system are presented in this
letter. The antenna consists of four rectangular patches on the
four sides of a square annular ring, and it is realized in planar
technology achieving a compact size, low cost, and geometrical
characteristics that are suitable for the Tigrisat project, with the
mission of dust storms detection over Iraq. The antenna geometry is compatible with any CubeSat standard structure, ensuring
a gain of 7.3 dBi while allowing an easy fit of optical payloads for earth-observation missions. Simulation results show
that antenna return loss is well below 10 dB at the operational frequency of 2.45 GHz, and the achieved directivity is
8.3 dBi along the direction of maximum radiation. Furthermore,
simulations point out that the designed antenna system exhibits
a circular polarization. A prototype of the designed antenna
system has been realized. Experimental measurements confirm
that antenna achieves good radiation properties and impedance
matching at the operational frequency and the desired far-field
directivity. Comparison to simulation results shows a negligible
impact of the spacecraft body on antenna performances. Finally,
it is also important to mention here that by changing the phase
of the feeding line, different radiation patterns and polarization
can be achieved, thus allowing the use of the designed S-band
patch antenna system also when different project requirements
are requested.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The Tigrisat project has been funded by the Italian Ministry of
Foreign AffairsTask Force Iraq in collaboration with the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Republic of Iraq. The
authors wish to thank P. DAtanasio and A. Zambotti for supporting the measurements at ENEA Casaccia, and S. Chicarella
and L. Martini for help in the antenna fabrication.
REFERENCES

Fig. 6. Simulated (dashed line) and measured (full line) directivity radiation
pattern in the -plane.

Measurements on the radiation pattern have been conducted

following the test procedures suggested in [11]. In particular,
the prototype patch antenna has been positioned, inside the anechoic chamber, on a -step rotating system relative to a source
antenna, in order to measure its radiation pattern as a function
of angle. Fig. 6 (full line) shows the measured normalized radiation pattern compared to the simulated one at 2.45 GHz,
in the -plane, together with the 3-dB reference level. The
figure shows a good agreement between simulations and measurements with a 3-dB aperture of the measured patch antenna
system of about
. Moreover, due to the symmetry in the antenna geometry, similar results were found for the radiation pattern measured in the orthogonal plane with respect to the considered one.

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