Crafting very low frequency magnetoelectric antenna via piezoelectric and electromechanical synergic optimization strategy

A boom in exploration for marine geology and ocean resources has resulted in a huge demand for radio navigation or special environment communications, in turn spurring the rapid development of portable underwater wireless communication technology. State of the art acoustic communication methods used today are plagued by substantial transmission delays, multipath effects, and doppler frequency shifts, among other challenges, thus impeding the advancement of underwater wireless communication technology. Low-frequency electromagnetic transmission has proven to be a prospective solution for underwater communication, but the conventional electrical antennas is too large for portable underwater wireless communication. Emergent magnetoelectric (ME) antennas driven by piezoelectric materials have become a promising solution for miniaturizing very low frequency (VLF) communication systems. Here, a theoretical model between the radiation performance and piezoelectric material properties of the ME antenna was conducted. Guide by the theory analysis, Pb(In1/2Nb1/2)O3-Pb(Mn1/3Sb2/3)O3-Pb(Zr0.49Ti0.51)O3 (PIN-PMS-PZT) piezoelectric ceramic simultaneous with high d33 and Qm (d33 ∼ 401, Qm ∼ 1510) has been designed to enhance the magnetoelectric radiation of the VLF ME antenna. The PIN-PMS-PZT based ME antenna achieves a large converse magnetoelectric response 1.78 Gs·cm/V in EMR, which is almost doubled to commercial PZT based ME antenna. More importantly, a VLF communication system was built based on the VLF antenna, which successfully transmitted digital signals using Amplitude-Shift-Keying (ASK) modulation. It is believed that the presented work could provide a theoretical basis and feasible technical path for the employment of ME antennas in the future.