[LeArc] Plastic antennas.

[Joseph L. Rossmiller]

This is from the March 7th New York Times.  While the application they
are talking about is primarlly the cell phone service.  This new antenna
technology could easily find it's way into amateur radio hand helds.

73 de Joe - AG9Y

March 7, 2002

WHAT'S NEXT

Shrinking and Rethinking the Old Vertical Antenna

By DAVID F. GALLAGHER

As cellphones start to approach the size of matchboxes, their antennas
are shrinking, too. In the tiniest new phones the antenna is often
hidden inside, where it may take the form of a piece of foil or a coiled
wire. But a new material may allow antennas for phones and other devices
to become both obvious and invisible at the same time.

The material was invented by Tom A. Aisenbrey, general manager at
Integral Technologies (news/quote), a tiny company with offices in
Bellingham, Wash., and Vancouver, British Columbia. While working on a
more traditional antenna, he stumbled across a way to mix a metallic
compound with plastic or rubber to make a conductive material that can
be molded into any shape. That makes it possible to create phones in
which the plastic case serves as the antenna.

Because the material is such an effective conductor, it reduces the
amount of battery power needed to send a signal and offers better
reception than a traditional antenna, Integral says.

Mr. Aisenbrey has been trying out prototype antennas on his own
cellphone for months.  He said that the antenna he is now using is a
careful blend of silicone and his metallic compound, the ingredients of
which are a company secret. The silicone casing makes a good shock
absorber if the phone is dropped, he said, and the antenna can pull in a
signal even in deep valleys where reception may ordinarily be poor.
Integral says that the manufacturing costs of the new antennas will be
the same as or less than those of traditional metal ones.

Lothar Schmidt, a technical manager at Cetecom, a company that was hired
by Integral to assess the antenna, said tests had shown that in some
cases the new antenna more than doubled a cellphone's outgoing signal
strength.

Integral is working with GE Plastics to help it develop and market the
material, and the two companies are talking to several cellphone makers
about using it in their products, said William Robinson, Integral's
chief executive.

Of course, there are other gadgets that could benefit from better
antennas, like those that make use of the short-range wireless standard
Bluetooth and the Global Positioning System, the satellite network that
allows users to plot precise locations. Integral is even talking to a
provider of satellite tracking services about turning truck bumpers into
giant antennas by making them out of a rubbery blend of the new
material. The antennas would improve communication with low-orbit
satellites that allow the company to report the location of a truck and
status information back to its clients.

The bumpers will need some exposure to the open sky to communicate with
the satellites. But unlike a cellphone network, the tracking system does
not need to remain in constant contact to do its job, so it is not a
crisis if the signal is temporarily blocked by tunnels or buildings.

Mr. Robinson said that Integral also planned to make flat antenna strips
that could be attached to the sides of shipping containers so that they
could be tracked the same way. The strips will be an improvement over
standard metal antennas, which are often targets for vandals or are
accidentally broken off, he said.

Mr. Aisenbrey said that the same principle could be applied to cars,
where "you could turn the gasket of your windshield into an antenna." Or
manufacturers could build an antenna into the surface of a boat's deck.

The United States military has taken a similar approach by building
metal antennas into the structural frame of airplanes. SkyCross, a
company based in Melbourne, Fla., that has developed commercial
applications for some military communications technology, is working to
apply the concept to cars and perhaps buildings.

When the antenna is structurally embedded in a car, it becomes "a very
effective radiator" of electromagnetic waves, said Alan L. Haase, chief
executive of Skycross. An antenna built into the walls of a building
could do the same thing, he said.

Skycross is also looking at technology that would allow it to "print" an
antenna on the inside of a cellphone's case, Mr. Haase said.

Integral's invention shows that plastic, hardly a cutting-edge material,
still has plenty of untapped high-tech potential.

Researchers have devoted much attention lately to conductive plastics,
which, unlike Integral's material, do not require any metal to make them
effective carriers of electric current. The technology is already being
used to create moldable plastic batteries for electronic products. For
example, NEC released a laptop last year with a lithium-polymer battery
wrapped around the back of its screen.

Blends of plastic and metal compounds similar to the one in Integral's
antenna are often found in military equipment, where they act as
shielding material to keep enemy sensors from spotting sources of
electromagnetic energy. They can also shield people from energy sources
in computers and other devices.

Mr. Aisenbrey said that Integral's innovation was to tweak the blend to
make it conductive enough for use as an antenna � in effect, turning a
barricade into a pathway.

Experts on antenna design said that Integral's technology sounded
interesting but that they would need more information to evaluate it.
They noted that other researchers were also looking to novel materials
as a way to boost antenna performance.

Dr. David M. Pozar, professor of electrical and computer engineering at
the University of Massachusetts and a researcher in the school's Antenna
Laboratory, questioned Integral's emphasis on seeking to patent its
technology.

"Patents in the antenna area, by themselves, do not ensure the success
of a product, and it is usually very easy to circumvent patents" in this
field, Dr. Pozar said. Performance and price rather than patents are the
keys to success, he added.