Integrated planar inverted-F antenna on laptop computer’s hinge for 2.4/5.2/5.8-GHz WLAN operation

A compact planar inverted-F antenna (PIFA) placed on one of the two hinges of a laptop computer is proposed for wireless local-area network (WLAN) operation. The aim of this design is to integrate the PIFA’s metal surroundings as part of the radiating structure. When the PIFA is fed, resonant modes in the hinge slot bounded by the two hinges, display ground plane, and keyboard ground plane can in turn be excited. Since the 200 × 5 mm2 slot is much larger than the 10 × 5 mm2 PIFA itself, the latter, although compact and structurally simple, can be made efficiently radiating with the help of the former. Measured efficiencies are all over 50% in the desired three WLAN bands