Biologically Inspired Four Elements Compact Antenna Arrays With Enhanced Sensitivity for Direction of Arrival Estimation

A new four elements compact antenna array is presented and discussed to achieve enhanced phase resolution without sacrificing the array output power. This structure inspired by the Ormia Ochracea’s coupled ears. The analogy between this insect acute directional hearing capabilities and the electrically compact antenna array is used to enhance the array sensitivity to direction of arrival estimation of an electromagnetic wave. This four elements biomimetic compact array is composed of four strongly coupled antenna elements and two external coupling networks which are designed to enhance the phase resolutions between all antenna element outputs without decrease in the array output power. In other words, this four elements compact array extracts the same power level from the incident EM wave compared with regular array, while the output phase sensitivity is significantly enhanced. The simulation results confirm the advantages of this new compact array compared with the previously reported ones in the literature.