Indian researchers claim to have developed "world's smallest antenna"

Researchers Sunday claimed to have invented the world's smallest super compact ultra-wideband (UWB) planar antenna that can find application in homes and the military among other domains.

Academician Professor Srikanta Pal, who is with the Birla Institute of Technology in Mesra, and his research scholar Mrinmoy Chakraborty have developed the antenna.

"Our antenna is the world's smallest at 14 mm X 11 mm, with much more than a 10:1 bandwidth," Chakraborty, a PhD student with BIT-Mesra, said.

The UWB technology brings mobility of wireless communications with high data rates, they said, adding that the technology was designed for short range, wireless personal area networks (WPANs), with the objective of freeing people from wires.

The antenna is cheap and their goal was to reduce the size so that it can be pasted on any curved surface.

"The material used for this design is fibre reinforced plastics, which is less expensive. The fabrication process is simple wet chemical etching method," Pal, who is a Honorary Research Fellow at the Birmingham University in UK from 2010-2014 for his work in radio astronomy, said.