CN115377676A

CN115377676A - Antenna module and wearable equipment

Info

Publication number: CN115377676A
Application number: CN202211170643.1A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 张蕾
Original assignee: Guangdong Oppo Mobile Telecommunications Corp Ltd
Current assignee: Guangdong Oppo Mobile Telecommunications Corp Ltd
Priority date: 2022-09-23
Filing date: 2022-09-23
Publication date: 2022-11-22

Abstract

The utility model relates to an antenna module and wearable equipment, antenna module include the center, and the center encloses to establish and forms accommodating space, and the center is equipped with the irradiator, and irradiator and center insulate each other, and in accommodating space was located to the PCB board, the PCB board had the headroom, and the headroom is equipped with the microstrip line, and the microstrip line is connected with the irradiator in order to form antenna radiation unit jointly, and antenna radiation unit is used for receiving the GPS signal. The utility model provides an antenna module and wearable equipment utilizes the headroom district on the PCB board to set up the microstrip line, and the microstrip line is connected with the irradiator in order to form antenna radiation unit jointly to under the condition of ensureing the antenna performance, reduced the line length of walking of irradiator on the center, reduced the requirement to the line size of walking of center from this, thereby be favorable to the miniaturization of center, in order to satisfy the needs of the whole miniaturized design of wearable equipment.

Description

Antenna module and wearable equipment

Technical Field

The application relates to wearable equipment technical field, especially relates to antenna module and wearable equipment.

Background

With the development of society, people pay more and more attention to physical health while the physical life is satisfied. At present, intelligent wearable equipment provides a good choice for monitoring user body indexes and user motion indexes, can realize the health condition of real-time monitoring user body, also can supervise the user to develop good motion habits.

The wearable device can be positioned by arranging the antenna for receiving the GPS signal on the wearable device.

However, in the related art, the routing manner of the antenna occupies a large space, and the arrangement in the wearable device is limited, so that it is difficult to meet the performance of the antenna and adapt to the miniaturization requirement of the wearable device.

Disclosure of Invention

The application provides an antenna module and wearable equipment to solve and be difficult to adapt to the technical problem of wearable equipment's miniaturization demand when satisfying the antenna performance.

In one aspect, the present application provides an antenna assembly comprising:

the middle frame is provided with a radiator, and the radiator and the middle frame are insulated from each other; and

the PCB board, the PCB board is located in the accommodating space, the PCB board has the headroom, the headroom is equipped with the microstrip line, the microstrip line with the irradiator is connected in order to form antenna radiation unit jointly, antenna radiation unit is used for receiving the GPS signal.

On the other hand, the application provides a wearable equipment, including display screen, back lid and foretell antenna module, the display screen with back lid connect respectively in the both sides that back mutually carried on the back of the body of center.

The microstrip line is arranged in the clearance area on the PCB, and the microstrip line is connected with the radiating body to jointly form the antenna radiation unit, so that the wiring length of the radiating body on the middle frame is reduced under the condition of ensuring the performance of the antenna, the requirement on the wiring size of the middle frame is reduced, the miniaturization of the middle frame is facilitated, and the requirement on the overall miniaturization design of the wearable device is met.

Drawings

In order to more clearly illustrate the embodiments of the present application or the technical solutions in the prior art, the drawings used in the description of the embodiments or the prior art will be briefly described below, it is obvious that the drawings in the following description are only some embodiments of the present application, and for those skilled in the art, other drawings can be obtained according to the drawings without creative efforts.

Fig. 1 is a perspective view of a wearable device according to an embodiment;

fig. 2 is another perspective view of a wearable device according to an embodiment;

fig. 3 is a schematic structural diagram of an antenna assembly of a wearable device according to an embodiment;

FIG. 4 is a return loss plot of GPS signals for an antenna assembly of a wearable device of an embodiment;

fig. 5 is a schematic circuit block diagram of a wearable device according to an embodiment.

The reference numbers illustrate:

100. a wearable device; 10. a display screen; 20. a rear cover; 30. a middle frame; 30a, a housing space; 30b, a radiator; 31. the long side; 32. a short side; 40. a PCB board; 40a, a clearance area; 40b, a feed source; 40c, a feed point; 40d, ground feed point; 50. a microstrip line; 50a, a first end; 50b, a second end; 60. an elastic connector; 70. and (4) binding the bands.

Detailed Description

To facilitate an understanding of the present application, the present application will now be described more fully with reference to the accompanying drawings. Preferred embodiments of the present application are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. This application may, however, be embodied in many different forms and should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein. Rather, these embodiments are provided so that this disclosure will be thorough and complete.

As used herein, "wearable device" refers to a device capable of receiving and/or transmitting communication signals including, but not limited to, a device connected via any one or several of the following connections:

(1) Via wireline connections, such as via Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), digital Subscriber Line (DSL), digital cable, direct cable connections;

(2) Via a Wireless interface means such as a cellular Network, a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), a digital television Network such as a DVB-H Network, a satellite Network, an AM-FM broadcast transmitter.

A wearable device arranged to communicate over a wireless interface may be referred to as a "mobile terminal". Examples of mobile terminals include, but are not limited to, the following wearable devices:

(1) Satellite or cellular telephones;

(2) Personal Communications Systems (PCS) terminals that may combine cellular radiotelephones with data processing, facsimile, and data Communications capabilities;

(3) Radio telephones, pagers, internet/intranet access, web browsers, notebooks, calendars, personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) equipped with Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers;

(4) Conventional laptop and/or palmtop receivers;

(5) Conventional laptop and/or palmtop radiotelephone transceivers, and the like.

Referring to fig. 1, as shown in fig. 1 and fig. 2, in an embodiment, a wearable device 100 is provided, the wearable device 100 includes a display screen 10, a back cover 20, and a middle frame 30, and the display screen 10 and the back cover 20 are respectively connected to two opposite sides of the middle frame 30.

In the present embodiment, the middle frame 30 serves as a carrier for disposing the antenna, and the middle frame 30 becomes a part of the antenna assembly. Specifically, as shown in fig. 3, the antenna assembly includes a middle frame 30 and a PCB 40, the middle frame 30 is surrounded to form a receiving space 30a, the middle frame 30 is provided with a radiator 30b, and the radiator 30b and the middle frame 30 are insulated from each other. There are various possible ways to insulate the radiator 30b and the middle frame 30 from each other, for example, in some embodiments, the middle frame 30 is made of metal, and the inner wall of the middle frame 30 corresponding to the radiator 30b is provided with an insulating film (not shown) for electrically insulating the radiator 30b and the middle frame 30. The metal material includes, but is not limited to, aluminum alloy, magnesium alloy or stainless steel. For another example, the middle frame 30 is made of a non-conductive material, for example, the middle frame 30 may be made of a non-metal material such as plastic, rubber, silica gel, wood or ceramic, and in this embodiment, the radiator 30b may be integrally formed on the middle frame 30 or attached to the inner wall of the middle frame 30. The material of the middle frame 30 and the insulation manner between the middle frame 30 and the radiator 30b are not limited herein.

The PCB 40 is disposed in the accommodating space 30a, the PCB 40 has a clearance area 40a, the clearance area 40a is provided with a microstrip line 50, the microstrip line 50 is connected with the radiator 30b to form an antenna radiation unit, and the antenna radiation unit is configured to receive a GPS signal.

In the antenna assembly, the microstrip line 50 is disposed by using the clearance area 40a on the PCB 40, and the microstrip line 50 is connected with the radiator 30b to form an antenna radiation unit together, so that the routing length of the radiator 30b on the middle frame 30 is reduced under the condition of ensuring the antenna performance, and the requirement for the routing size of the middle frame 30 is reduced, thereby being beneficial to the miniaturization of the middle frame 30 and meeting the requirement of the overall miniaturization design of the wearable device 100.

Referring to fig. 4, fig. 4 shows a return loss plot of a GPS signal of an antenna assembly, wherein the S11 parameter represents the return loss characteristic, typically seen by a network analyzer, in terms of dB value of loss and impedance characteristics. The parameter indicates that the transmitting efficiency of the antenna is not good, and the larger the value is, the larger the energy reflected by the antenna is, so that the efficiency of the antenna is poorer. As shown in FIG. 4, the antenna assembly has an S11 of-17.721 dB at an operating frequency of 1.5558GHz, and therefore, the antenna efficiency of the antenna assembly is good.

In some embodiments, the radiator 30b includes an FPC antenna radiator, and the FPC antenna radiator and the microstrip line 50 are both strip-shaped and parallel to each other. In some embodiments, the FPC antenna radiator and microstrip line 50 may be in other shapes as long as the requirement of receiving GPS signals is met.

The antenna radiation unit includes an IFA antenna (i.e., an inverted F antenna), a Monopole antenna (i.e., a Monopole antenna), or a Loop antenna (i.e., a Loop antenna), and the type of the antenna radiation unit is not limited herein.

The radiator 30b may be an LDS (Laser-Direct-structuring) antenna, in some embodiments, the middle frame 30 of the wearable device 100 of the present application is made of LDS (Laser-Direct-structuring) material, the middle frame 30 is first injection-molded according to a pre-designed shell structure, and then the radiator 30b is formed inside the middle frame 30 by using a Laser engraving and plating process (specifically, active metal seeds and additive particles on the surface of the radiator 30b inside the middle frame 30 are released by Laser light etching to generate a micro-rough surface with high adhesion, and then a metallization material is deposited and permeates into and adheres to the inside of the middle frame 30 that is processed by Laser to form the radiator 30 b), and the antenna radiator formed by the process is called an LDS antenna

Referring to fig. 3, the microstrip line 50 includes a first end 50a and a second end 50b, the radiator 30b is electrically connected to the first end 50a, a feeding point 40c and a ground feeding point 40d are disposed in the clearance area 40a, and the feeding point 40c and the ground feeding point 40d are both located at the second end 50b, so that the distance between the feeding point 40c and the ground feeding point 40d is short, and the microstrip line 50 has a sufficient length to perform a radiation function. In some embodiments, the microstrip line 50 may also be formed on the PCB board 40 by an LDS process.

Further, the orthographic projections of the feeding point 40c and the ground feeding point 40d on the PCB 40 coincide with each other, so that the feeding point 40c and the ground feeding point 40d are at the same position, and more specifically, the feeding point 40c and the ground feeding point 40d are integrated into one, and in this arrangement, the maximization of the effective part of the antenna radiation unit is achieved.

It should be noted that the PCB 40 is used to feed and excite the antenna radiation unit through the feeding point 40c, so that the antenna radiation unit covers the operating frequency band of the GPS bandwidth.

The PCB 40 is provided with a feed source 40b and a matching circuit (not shown), the feed source 40b is used for receiving and transmitting radio frequency signals, and the microstrip line 50 is connected to the feed source 40b through the matching circuit. It can be understood that the feeding point 40c of the microstrip line 50 is connected to the matching circuit, so that when the feed source 40b sends out a radio frequency signal, the radio frequency signal can pass through the matching circuit and then be guided into the microstrip line 50 and the radiator 30b by the feeding point 40c, so as to excite the microstrip line 50 and the radiator 30b to send out an electromagnetic wave.

In some embodiments, the antenna assembly includes an elastic connector 60, and the first end 50a is connected to the radiator 30b through the elastic connector 60, so that the elastic connector 60 maintains a stable connection between the radiator 30b and the microstrip line 50, thereby improving the stability of the antenna radiation unit during operation.

The elastic connector 60 includes, but is not limited to, a spring or conductive foam.

In some embodiments, the middle frame 30 has a rectangular shape including a long side 31 and a short side 32, and the radiator 30b is attached to the inner wall of the short side 32 of the middle frame 30, so that the space of the long side 31 is not wasted because the radiator 30b is closer to the short side 32 in length, and therefore, the radiator 30b is disposed on the short side 32, and the area of the short side 32 not covered by the radiator 30b is small, and accordingly, if the radiator 30b is disposed on the long side 31, the area of the long side 31 not covered by the radiator 30b is increased, thereby wasting the receiving space 30a of the middle frame 30. In some embodiments, the length of the radiator 30b is set to be equal to the length of the short side 32 of the middle frame 30, so that the accommodating space 30a of the middle frame 30 can be fully utilized, and the wearable device 100 can be made smaller.

In some embodiments, the length of the radiator 30b is greater than the length of the microstrip line 50, and each extends along the short side 32 of the middle frame 30. Because the middle frame 30 has more sufficient space for arranging the radiator 30b than the PCB for arranging the microstrip line 50, the middle frame 30 can be used to arrange the radiator 30b with a sufficient length, and the microstrip line 50 can be shortened, so that the PCB 40 only needs to reserve a sufficient clearance area 40a for arranging the microstrip line 50, thereby being beneficial to meeting the requirement of arranging other elements on the PCB 40.

In some embodiments, the length of the radiator 30b is 3cm to 4cm, such as 3cm, 3.2cm, 3.5cm, 3.6cm, 3.9cm, or 4cm; the radiator 30b has a width of 0.3cm to 0.8cm, such as 0.3cm, 0.4cm, 0.5cm, 0.6cm, 0.7cm, or 0.8cm. With this arrangement, the radiator 30b can exert a better radiation effect.

The length of the microstrip line 50 is 2.5cm to 3.5cm, such as 2.5cm, 2.7cm, 2.8cm, 3cm, 3.3cm or 3.5cm; the microstrip line 50 has a width of 0.3cm to 0.8cm, such as 0.3cm, 0.4cm, 0.5cm, 0.6cm, 0.7cm or 0.8cm. With such an arrangement, the microstrip line 50 can exert a better radiation effect.

Referring again to fig. 1 and 2, in some embodiments, straps 70 are attached to the middle frame 30, and the straps 70 are used to secure the middle frame 30 to a user's limb, such as an extremity, it being understood that the straps 70 can secure the middle frame 30 to any position of the user that requires securing, and not limited to only the extremity.

In some embodiments, the wearable device 100 is a smart watch, and the housing 30a can be used to mount electronic components such as a battery, a processor, a biosensor, and the like. Biosensors may be used to detect biological data such as heart rate, respiration rate, blood pressure, or body fat, and in some embodiments, may also be used to detect a state of motion such as for step counting. In other embodiments, the wearable device 100 may be a sports watch, a common form of which is an electronic watch, or a conventional watch, a common form of which is a mechanical watch, or the like. In other embodiments, the wearable device 100 may also be a smart band or the like.

In some embodiments, the strap 70 is divided into two segments, each of the two segments of the strap 70 has one end connected to the middle frame 30, the ends of the two segments of the strap 70 facing away from the middle frame 30 can be fastened, and the two fastened segments of the strap 70 and the middle frame 30 together enclose a receiving space 30a for the wearable device 100 to be worn on the wrist or the arm or other parts of the body of the user through the strap 70.

In other embodiments, the strap 70 may be a one-piece structure, two ends of the strap 70 are connected to the middle frame 30, and the size of the accommodating space 30a of the strap 70 may be adjusted by other structures to facilitate the wearing of the user.

With reference to fig. 5, fig. 5 is a block diagram of a circuit module of the wearable device 100 provided in the embodiment of the present application. The wearable device 100 may include Radio Frequency (RF) circuitry 501, memory 502 including one or more computer-readable storage media, input unit 503, display unit 504, sensors 505, audio circuitry 506, wireless Fidelity (WiFi) module 507, processor 508 including one or more processing cores, and power supply 509, among other components, and those skilled in the art will appreciate that the wearable device 100 configuration shown in fig. 5 does not constitute a limitation of the wearable device 100, may include more or less components than those shown, may combine certain components, or may be arranged in different components.

The rf circuit 501 may be used for receiving and transmitting information, or receiving and transmitting signals during a call, and in particular, receives downlink information of a base station and then sends the received downlink information to one or more processors 508 for processing; in addition, data relating to uplink is transmitted to the base station. In general, radio frequency circuit 501 includes, but is not limited to, an antenna, at least one Amplifier, a tuner, one or more oscillators, a Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card, a transceiver, a coupler, a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA), a duplexer, and the like. In addition, the radio frequency circuit 501 may also communicate with a network and other devices through wireless communication. The wireless communication may use any communication standard or protocol, including but not limited to Global System for Mobile communications (GSM), general Packet Radio Service (GPRS), code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA), long Term Evolution (LTE), email, short Message Service (SMS), and the like.

The memory 502 may be used to store applications and data. Memory 502 stores applications containing executable code. The application programs may constitute various functional modules. The processor 508 executes various functional applications and data processing by executing application programs stored in the memory 502. The memory 502 may mainly include a program storage area and a data storage area, wherein the program storage area may store an operating system, an application program required by at least one function (such as a sound playing function, an image playing function, etc.), and the like; the storage data area may store data created from use of the wearable device 100 (such as audio data, phone book, etc.), and the like. Further, the memory 502 may include high speed random access memory, and may also include non-volatile memory, such as at least one magnetic disk storage device, flash memory device, or other volatile solid state storage device. Accordingly, the memory 502 may also include a memory controller to provide the processor 508 and the input unit 503 access to the memory 502.

The input unit 503 may be used to receive input numbers, character information, or user characteristic information (such as a fingerprint), and generate a keyboard, mouse, joystick, optical, or trackball signal input related to user setting and function control. In particular, in one particular embodiment, the input unit 503 may include a touch-sensitive surface as well as other input devices. The touch-sensitive surface, also referred to as a touch antenna assembly or touch pad, may collect touch operations by a user (e.g., operations by a user on or near the touch-sensitive surface using a finger, a stylus, or any other suitable object or attachment) thereon or nearby, and drive the corresponding connection device according to a predetermined program. Alternatively, the touch sensitive surface may comprise two parts, a touch detection means and a touch controller. The touch detection device detects the touch direction of a user, detects a signal brought by touch operation and transmits the signal to the touch controller; the touch controller receives touch information from the touch sensing device, converts the touch information into touch point coordinates, and sends the touch point coordinates to the processor 508, and can receive and execute commands sent from the processor 508.

Further, the touch-sensitive surface may cover the liquid crystal panel, and when a touch operation is detected on or near the touch-sensitive surface, the touch operation is transmitted to the processor 508 to determine the type of the touch event, and then the processor 508 provides a corresponding visual output on the liquid crystal panel according to the type of the touch event.

The display unit 504 may be used to display information input by or provided to the user as well as various graphical user interfaces of the wearable device 100, which may be made up of graphics, text, icons, video, and any combination thereof.

Although in FIG. 5 the touch sensitive surface and the liquid crystal panel are implemented as two separate components for input and output functions, in some embodiments the touch sensitive surface may be integrated with the liquid crystal panel for input and output functions. It is understood that the antenna assembly 100 may include an input unit 503 and a display unit 504.

The wearable device 100 may also include at least one sensor 505, such as proximity sensors, motion sensors, and other sensors. Wherein the proximity sensor may turn off the liquid crystal panel and/or backlight when the wearable device 100 is moved to the ear. As one of the motion sensors, the gravity acceleration sensor can detect the magnitude of acceleration in each direction (generally, three axes), can detect the magnitude and direction of gravity when the mobile phone is stationary, and can be used for applications of recognizing the posture of the mobile phone (such as horizontal and vertical screen switching, related games, magnetometer posture calibration), vibration recognition related functions (such as pedometer and tapping), and the like; as for other sensors such as a gyroscope, a barometer, a hygrometer, a thermometer, and an infrared sensor, which may be further configured to the wearable device 100, detailed descriptions thereof are omitted.

The audio circuit 506 may provide an audio interface between the user and the wearable device 100 through a speaker, microphone. The audio circuit 506 can convert the received audio data into an electrical signal, transmit the electrical signal to a speaker, and convert the electrical signal into a sound signal to output; on the other hand, the microphone converts the collected sound signal into an electrical signal, which is received by the audio circuit 506 and converted into audio data, which is then processed by the audio data output processor 508 and then sent to, for example, another wearable device 100 via the rf circuit 501, or output to the memory 502 for further processing. The audio circuit 506 may also include an earphone jack to provide communication of a peripheral earphone with the wearable device 100.

Wireless fidelity (WiFi) belongs to short-range wireless transmission technology, and the wearable device 100 can help the user send and receive e-mails, browse web pages, access streaming media and the like through the wireless fidelity module 507, and provides wireless broadband internet access for the user. Although fig. 5 shows the wireless fidelity module 507, it is understood that it does not belong to the essential components of the wearable device 100, and may be omitted entirely as needed within the scope not changing the essence of the invention.

The processor 508 is a control center of the wearable device 100, connects various parts of the entire wearable device 100 by various interfaces and lines, and performs various functions of the wearable device 100 and processes data by running or executing applications stored in the memory 502 and calling up data stored in the memory 502, thereby monitoring the wearable device 100 as a whole. Optionally, processor 508 may include one or more processing cores; preferably, the processor 508 may integrate an application processor, which primarily handles operating systems, user interfaces, application programs, etc., and a modem processor, which primarily handles wireless communications. It will be appreciated that the modem processor described above may not be integrated into the processor 508.

The wearable device 100 also includes a power supply 509 to power the various components. Preferably, the power supply 509 may be logically connected to the processor 508 through a power management system, so that the power management system may manage charging, discharging, and power consumption. The power supply 509 may also include any component such as one or more dc or ac power sources, recharging systems, power failure detection circuitry, power converters or inverters, power status indicators, and the like.

Although not shown in fig. 5, the wearable device 100 may further include a bluetooth module or the like, which is not described herein. In specific implementation, the above modules may be implemented as independent entities, or may be combined arbitrarily to be implemented as the same or several entities, and specific implementation of the above modules may refer to the foregoing method embodiments, which are not described herein again.

The technical features of the embodiments described above may be arbitrarily combined, and for the sake of brevity, all possible combinations of the technical features in the embodiments described above are not described, but should be considered as being within the scope of the present specification as long as there is no contradiction between the combinations of the technical features.

The above-mentioned embodiments only express several implementation modes of the present application, and the description thereof is specific and detailed, but not construed as limiting the scope of the claims. It should be noted that, for a person skilled in the art, several variations and modifications can be made without departing from the concept of the present application, and these are all within the scope of protection of the present application. Therefore, the protection scope of the present patent shall be subject to the appended claims.

Claims

1. An antenna assembly, comprising:

2. The antenna assembly of claim 1, wherein the radiator comprises an FPC antenna radiator, the FPC antenna radiator and the microstrip line being strip-shaped and parallel to each other;

and/or the antenna radiation unit comprises an IFA antenna, a Monopole antenna or a Loop antenna.

3. The antenna assembly of claim 1 or 2, wherein the microstrip line comprises a first end and a second end, wherein the radiator is electrically connected to the first end, wherein a feeding point and a ground feeding point are disposed in the clearance area, and wherein the feeding point and the ground feeding point are both located at the second end.

4. The antenna assembly of claim 3, wherein orthographic projections of the feed point and the ground feed point on the PCB coincide with each other, and the PCB is configured to excite the antenna radiating element through the feed point feed, so that the antenna radiating element covers an operating band of a GPS bandwidth.

5. The antenna assembly of claim 3, including a flexible connector, said first end being connected to said radiator by said flexible connector.

6. The antenna assembly of claim 5, wherein the elastic connector comprises a spring or a conductive foam.

7. The antenna assembly of claim 1, wherein the middle frame has a rectangular shape including a long side and a short side, and the radiator is attached to an inner wall of the short side of the middle frame.

8. The antenna assembly of claim 1, wherein the PCB board is provided with a feed source and a matching circuit, the feed source is used for receiving and transmitting radio frequency signals, and the microstrip line is connected to the feed source through the matching circuit.

9. The antenna assembly according to claim 7 or 8, wherein the length of the radiator is greater than the length of the microstrip line, and each extends along a short side of the middle frame.

10. The antenna assembly of claim 9, wherein the length of the radiator is 3cm to 4cm and the width of the radiator is 0.3cm to 0.8cm;

and/or the length of the microstrip line is 2.5 cm-3.5 cm, and the width of the microstrip line is 0.3 cm-0.8 cm.

11. The antenna assembly of claim 1, wherein the middle frame is made of metal, and an insulating film is disposed on an inner wall of the middle frame corresponding to the radiator, the insulating film being configured to electrically insulate the radiator from the middle frame;

or, the middle frame is made of a non-conductive material, and the radiator is integrally formed on the middle frame or attached to the inner wall of the middle frame.

12. A wearable device comprising a display screen, a back cover, and the antenna assembly of any of claims 1-11, wherein the display screen and the back cover are attached to opposite sides of the center frame.