Design and fabrication of graphene-based absorbing textiles for 5G applications

A novel method for designing and fabricating graphene-based flexible absorbers is proposed. These absorbers consist of graphene-based coatings acting as lossy layers, textile spacers, and metallic backings serving as perfect electric conductors (PECs). Polyester fabric is selected as the textile substrate, while the coatings are composed of polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) matrices embedded with varying amounts of graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs). An analytical procedure is developed to design absorbers at a target resonant frequency using a rigorous theoretical model to determine the optimal spacer and lossy layer thicknesses based on material properties. Specifically, the absorber is designed for a resonance at 32.5 GHz, achieving a -10 dB bandwidth that covers the 5 G frequency range from 27.7 to 38.2 GHz. The graphene-based textile is fabricated and characterized, with measured absorption performance compared to theoretical predictions, demonstrating strong agreement.