Scientists found a new way of designing electromagnetic wave transmission antennas — such as the internet, television, cell phone and radio — using the logic of kirigami, ancient Japanese art of cutting and folding paper which is a variation of origami.
Using a sheet of transparent plastic coated with a conductive ink, the researchers were able to fashion a tool that allows the frequency to be adjusted simply by squeezing or pushing the folds. This invention can solve the vulnerability and cost problems of traditional antennas.
In kirigami, an Asian art developed between the 4th and 5th centuries, three-dimensional figures are created by cutting paper — creating flexible and malleable objects.
The research published in Nature Communications magazine showed that the Japanese technique provides a quick and economical solution for the construction of antennas that need to be quickly configured to transmit different lengths of electromagnetic waves.
“Kirigami is a natural model for a manufacturing process because of the simplicity with which complex 3D shapes can be created from a single 2D piece of material,” said Yury Gogotsi, PhD, Bach and Distinguished Professor in the College of Engineering. from Drexel, and co-author of the research.
To change the configuration of traditional antennas, it is necessary to add circuits that increase their complexity, making them bulkier, more vulnerable to failures and more expensive to manufacture.
However, using the kirigami technique, it is possible to produce them to be flexible, light and durable — characteristics crucial for their use in robotics and aerospace components, for example.
To build this new type of antenna, scientists used a sheet of acetate — a type of transparent plastic — covered with a layer of MXene, a paint with a high capacity for conducting electromagnetic waves and which easily adheres to the substrate, forming a durable and flexible surface.
“Our goal here was to simultaneously improve the tunability of antenna performance while also creating a simple manufacturing process for new microwave components by incorporating a versatile MXene nanomaterial with kirigami-inspired designs,” said Omid Niksan, PhD, of University of British Columbia, who co-authored the paper.
The frequency of transmissions is changed by pulling or squeezing the sheet, allowing frequencies to vary. In research, kirigami antennas have proven to be effective in three commonly used microwave bands: 2-4 GHz, 4-8 GHz, and 8-12 GHz.
“The next phase of this research will be to explore new materials and geometry for the antennas,” commented Niksan.
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This content was originally published in Scientists design flexible antennas using origami technique; understand on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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