Finite Element Analysis and Optimization of Acoustically Actuated Magnetoelectric Microantennas

The acoustically actuated magnetoelectric (ME) microantenna integrated on a film bulk acoustic resonator (FBAR) has exhibited a potential for communication and wireless sensing applications owing to the breakage of traditional antenna size limitation. However, the development is still at infancy, and much is unknown and unclear for the design of the ME microantennas and material selection. This article presents a finite element analysis-based method and a magnetic dipole model to analyze the radiation characteristics of ME antenna. The effects of piezoelectric (PE) and magnetostrictive (MS) materials and their thicknesses, shape, and area of the electrode, and damping factor of the MS material on the radiation characteristics of ME antenna are investigated in detail. Results show that with an optimized design and proper materials combination, FBARs with an ME microantenna of the size $200\,\, {}\times {}200\mu \text{m}$ could emit electromagnetic waves over 30 m with a maximum radiation power of up to $3.4\,\, {}\times {}10^{-7}$ W (−34.7 dBm), suitable for short-range communication and wireless sensing applications, demonstrating a great potential of the ME microantennas.