Electromagnetic antenna and transmission line utilizing photonic bandgap material

Abstract

A photonic bandgap antenna (PBA) (10') utilizes a periodic bandgap material (PBM), which is essentially a dielectric, to transmit, receive, or communicate electromagnetic radiation encoded with information. Further, a photonic bandgap transmission line (PBTL) (10") can also be constructed with the PBM. Because the PBA (10') and PBTL (10") do not utilize metal, the PBA (10') and PBTL (10") can be used in harsh environments, such as those characterized by high temperature and/or high pressure, and can be easily built into a dielectric structure such as a building wall or roof. Further, the PBA (10') and PBTL (10") inhibit scattering by incident electromagnetic radiation at frequencies outside those electromagnetic frequencies in the bandgap range associated with the PBM.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.