Square-ring microstrip antenna with a cross strip for compact circular polarization operation

A novel design of square-ring microstrip antenna with a cross strip for achieving compact circular polarization (CP) operation is proposed and experimentally studied. The cross strip can be placed in the centerlines or diagonals of the square-ring patch. Either design can make its excited fundamental-mode patch surface current path much longer than that in a conventional square microstrip antenna with same antenna size. By incorporating a small tuning stub for splitting the fundamental mode into two near-degenerate resonant modes with equal amplitudes and 90 degrees phase-difference compact CP operation for the proposed design can be obtained.