Abstract—To develop a reliable and cost effective communication platform for the telemedicine applications, novel antenna design has been presented using bacterial foraging optimization (BFO) technique. The proposed antenna geometry is achieved by etching a modified Koch curve fractal shape at the edges and a square shape slot at the center of the radiating element of a patch antenna. It has been found that the new antenna has achieved 43.79% size reduction and better resonating characteristic than the original patch. Representative results for both simulations and numerical validations are reported in order to assess the effectiveness of the developed methodology. Keywords—BFO, electrical permittivity, fractals, Koch curve. I. INTRODUCTION HE growth of the telecommunication systems is driving the engineering efforts to develop wideband and compact systems. This has started antenna research in different directions, one of which is by using fractal shaped antenna elements [1]-[3]. The geometrical properties of self-similar and space filling nature has motivated antenna design engineers to adopt this geometry a viable alternative to meet the requirement of small size and multiband operation [4]. There are several techniques published so far to reduce the size of microstrip antenna such as shorting pins, introducing of U-slots, using substrates of high dielectric constant and fractal geometry [5]-[7]. Fractal geometry is a very good solution to this problem. In particular, afractal geometry based on a finite number of fractal iterations is useful to achieve a good miniaturization and to provide enhanced bandwidth [8]-[11]. Fractal antenna has useful applications in cellular telephone, microwave communications and Telemedicine [10]. Telemedicine can be defined as the delivery of health care and the sharing of medical knowledge over a long distance, using telecommunication means. It is very effective technique to deliver special health care in the form of improved access and reduced cost to the patients in rural areas [12]. The wireless telemedicine systems can provide better healthcare delivery, irrespective of any geographical barriers and mobility constraints [13]. During last decade, soft computing techniques have gained popularity among scientists and researchers in every branch of engineering. An alternative method known as BFO recently becomes popular for optimizing parameters in antenna and antenna array problems. The idea of BFO is based on the fact Amar Partap Singh Pharwaha, Dr, is with Sant Longowal Institute of Engineering and Technology, Longowal, Sangrur, India (e-mail: amarpartapsingh@yahoo.com). that natural selection tends to eliminate animals with poor foraging strategies and favor those having successful foraging strategies [14]. After various generations, poor foraging strategies are either eliminated or restructured in to good ones [15], [16]. In such a framework, this paper considers a modified Koch curve shape for synthesis of proposed antenna able to fully exploit the degree of the geometry under test. In order to assess the effectiveness of design process, various parameters are taken in to account and illustrative results are shown. II. ANTENNA DESIGN & STRUCTURE Fig. 1 shows the simulated configuration of the proposed antenna with zero, first and seconder iteration order. The presented fractal geometry can be obtained by etching each side of the square patch by a modified Koch curve whose iteration factor is 1/5. The average electrical length of the patch increases with increase in the iteration numbers similar to the inductive and slot loading technique. In this paper only the first and the second iterations are considered since high order iterations do not make significant effect on antenna properties. Concerning the geometrical requirements, the maximum planar dimensions are set to 20x20 mm 2 on substrate of thickness 1.6 mm. (a) (b) (c) Fig. 1 Geometrical construction of proposed antennas (a) zero iteration (b) first iteration (c) second iteration A Novel Antenna Design for Telemedicine Applications Amar Partap Singh Pharwaha, Shweta Rani T World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology International Journal of Computer and Information Engineering Vol:7, No:12, 2013 1665 International Scholarly and Scientific Research & Innovation 7(12) 2013 ISNI:0000000091950263 Open Science Index, Computer and Information Engineering Vol:7, No:12, 2013 publications.waset.org/9996723/pdf