Van Aardt, RuanJoubert, JohanOdendaal, J.W. (Johann Wilhelm)2023-08-292023-08-292022-04Van Aardt, R.; Joubert, J.; Odendaal, J.W. A Dipole with Reflector-Backed Active Metasurface for Linear-to-Circular Polarization Reconfigurability. Materials 2022, 15, 3026. https://doi.org/10.3390/ma15093026.1996-1944 (online)10.3390/ma15093026http://hdl.handle.net/2263/92106DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT : The data presented in this study are on request from the main author.In recent years, significant advances have been made in diversifying the capabilities of communication systems by using reconfigurable antennas. There are many types of reconfigurable antennas—to achieve pattern, frequency, or polarization reconfigurability. These antennas are reconfigured either by the mechanical rotation of surfaces or by enabling or disabling specific sections of the structure using electrical switches. This paper focuses on the concept of a polarization reconfigurable antenna based on an active reflector-backed metasurface. An antenna system based on an active reflector-backed metasurface combined with a planar dipole is designed to achieve reconfigurable polarization. The polarization of the designed antenna can be switched between linear and circular polarization states using positive-intrinsic-negative diodes located in the unit cell elements of the metasurface. The measured results correlate well with the simulated results. The antenna has a physical size of 308 × 162 × 35 mm3 with an impedance bandwidth of 4.5% in the linear state and 7% in the circular state, as well as an axial ratio bandwidth larger than 8.3%.en© 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license.Dipole antennaReconfigurable polarizationPolarization diversityReflector-backedMetasurfaceArticle