A novel beam scanning microstrip leaky wave antenna based on liquid crystal material is proposed in this paper. Based on the dielectric anisotropy of the liquid crystal, the main beam angle of the antenna pattern can be easily adjusted with the changing of external bias voltages. Good agreement between simulated and measured results is found for the presented leaky wave antenna. Both the simulation and test frequencies of the antenna are set at 12 GHz. Besides, the measured data show that when the dielectric constant of the liquid crystal changes from 2.4 to 2.52, about 10 degrees tuning range of the main beam angle is achieved.
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