Characterization of Metasurface Lens Antenna for Sub-6 GHz Dual-Polarization Full-Dimension Massive MIMO and Multibeam Systems

A metasurface lens antenna fed by a planar 8 x 8 dual polarized antenna array is proposed and characterized for full-dimensional massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) and multibeam systems at sub-6 GHz bands. The lightweight multilayer metasurface structure consisting of Jerusalem cross elements is used for a planar lens design. The lens antenna with the size of 10 lambda(0) x 10 lambda(0) x 5 lambda(0) is fed by an 8 x 8 dual-polarized stacked patch array to operate over the range from 5.17 to 6.10 GHz, where lambda(0) is the free-space operating wavelength at the center frequency of 5.6 GHz. This article shows the scanning range of +/- 25 degrees with a maximum gain of 22.4 dBi and the gain variation of 3.3 dB at 5.6 GHz. Beam coverage performance, pattern envelope correlation coefficient, and port isolation properties demonstrate its full-dimension access capability of the antenna. Besides, the multibeam antenna system with high-gain coverage is achieved by beams operating at the same frequencies, while the frequency division multiplexing can be realized for the isolated beams. The proposed metasurface lens antenna, featuring lightweight, compactness, and low cost compared to a 3-D dielectric lens and low-complexity compared to the array scenarios, can be an alternative for fifth-generation (5G) sub-6 GHz frequency bands.