Abstract
This paper presents a novel artificial magnetic conductor (AMC) loaded dipole above FR4 substrate. The proposed AMC consists of two metal layers that shield the wave from the lossy substrate leading to a significant increase in the dipole efficiency over a wide bandwidth. The dipole is fed through vias that are connected to a wideband balun placed on the opposite side of the ground plane. The proposed assembly is fabricated and characterized. Measurements, which are in a very good agreement with the electromagnetic simulations, show that the operating fractional bandwidth achieves the value of 16.2%, 1.927-2.267 GHz, with peak radiation efficiency of 72.5%.