A Survey on Beamwidth Reconfigurable Antennas

Next-generation wireless communication systems need antennas with multi-functionality, adaptability, and flexibility to provide efficient utilization of power and electromagnetic spectrum. Reconfigurable antenna can fulfill these demands by delivering multiple functionalities in a single antenna structure. These antennas can dynamically adapt to changing system requirements by altering their operating parameters. Reconfigurable antennas are classified as frequency, pattern, polarization, and compound reconfiguration. Compound reconfigurable antenna involves simultaneous reconfiguration of two or more parameters such as frequency and pattern, frequency and polarization, pattern and polarization and frequency, pattern, and polarization. This paper presents a comprehensive survey on reconfigurable antenna designs, realizing beamwidth reconfiguration with single or dual orthogonal polarization. Furthermore, this paper also investigates the performance comparison of multifunctional reconfigurable antennas achieving beam steering and beamwidth reconfiguration in a single antenna structure. The challenges and future research directions in beamwidth reconfigurable antennas are also discussed in detail.