Graphene-based terahertz antennas for area-constrained applications

© 2017 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes,creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.Graphene is enabling a plethora of applications in a wide range of fields due to its unique electrical, mechanical, and optical properties. In the realm of wireless communications, graphene shows great promise for the implementation of miniaturized and tunable antennas in the terahertz band. These unique advantages open the door to disruptive wireless applications in highly integrated scenarios where conventional communications means cannot be employed. In this paper, recent advances in plasmonic graphene antennas are presented. Wireless Network-on-Chip (WNoC) and Software-Defined Metamaterials (SDMs), two new area-constrained applications uniquely suited to the characteristics of graphene antennas, are then described. The challenges in terms of antenna design and channel characterization are outlined for both case scenarios.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft