A novel high-gain textile antenna array system, fully integrated into a rescue-workerââ?¬â?¢s vest and operating in the Industrial,\r\nScientific, and Medical wireless band (2.4ââ?¬â??2.4835 GHz), is presented. The system comprises an array consisting of four tiptruncated\r\nequilateral triangular microstrip patch antennas (ETMPAs), a power divider, line stretchers, and coaxial cables. The array\r\nis vertically positioned on the human torso to produce a narrow beam in elevation, as such reducing fading and allowing to steer\r\nthe maximum gain in a small angular sector centered around the broadside direction. To allow simple low-cost beam steering, we\r\nspecifically minimize mutual coupling by using a relative large distance between the patches and by selecting the ETMPA element\r\nas the most suited topology from three potential patch geometries.Moreover, we investigate the stability of return loss and mutual\r\ncoupling characteristics under different relative humidity conditions, when bending the array, when placing the system on-body,\r\nand when covering it by different textile layers. Reflection coefficient and gain patterns are simulated and measured for the antenna\r\nsystem in free space and placed on the human body.
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