Dual-Polarized Communication Rectenna Array for Simultaneous Wireless Information and Power Transmission

A dual-polarized communication rectenna array with high isolation and low cross polarization for simultaneous wireless information and power transmission (SWIPT) is presented. It consists of a 2 × 2 element receiving antenna array and a high efficiency rectifier based on voltage doubler topology. The receiving element is corner-fed to achieve high isolation of more than 20 dB between the dual-polarized ports, which guarantees low mutual interference between the communication and the rectifying ports. To receive enough electromagnetic (EM) wave for rectifying and meanwhile meet the communication sensitivity, this 2 × 2 array uses its 2 × 2 vertical polarization ports and 1 × 2 horizontal polarization ports for power rectifying, and the rest 1 × 2 horizontal polarization ports for communication. For the communication port, the measured gain is 10.9 dBi and the cross polarization is less than -20 dB. The performance of the whole communication rectenna array has been measured, where a 2 × 4 circularly-polarized array with a gain of 17.5 dBi, settled 1 meter away is used as the transmitter. Measured results show that the system achieves a peak microwave - direct circuit (mw-dc) conversion efficiency of 74.9 % for the CW signal, and 67 % for the QPSK signal with 10 MHz channel bandwidth on the load of 345 Ω at 2.58 GHz operating frequency.