AN-SOF Antenna Simulation Software

AN-SOF is a simulation software for the modeling, analysis, and design of antennas. It allows users to describe antenna geometry, choose material properties, simulate far-field radiation patterns, analyze antenna parameters, and optimize designs.

AN-SOF is a must-have for anyone involved in the design and simulation of antennas. It offers a user-friendly interface, high accuracy, a growing library of antenna models >, and a wide range of simulation capabilities, making it an ideal tool for both professionals and students.

Areas of application

  • Modeling and design of wire antennas.
  • Antennas above a lossy ground plane.
  • Broadcast antennas over radial wire ground screens.
  • Single layer microstrip patch antennas.
  • Radiated emissions from printed circuit boards (PCBs).
  • Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) applications.
  • Passive circuits and non-radiating networks.
5-Element Yagi-Uda antenna with folded dipole

AN-SOF specializes in the modeling of wire antennas, including dipoles, monopoles, yagis, log-periodic arrays, helices, spirals, loops, horns, fractals and many other antenna types. The calculation method has been extended to also include single-layer microstrip patch antennas as well as printed circuit boards.

AN-SOF can be used to…

  • design better antennas
  • predict antenna performance
  • tune for performance
  • account for environment effects
  • optimize a design using scripts
  • get insight into the behavior of an antenna
  • try many times before building the real model
  • learn more about antennas
  • share our findings with colleagues 
  • and enjoy this exciting field!
Plotting Level Curves with AN-SOF and Scilab.
Modeling a patch antenna with AN-SOF.
Modeling a capacitively fed microstrip antenna with AN-SOF.

Fast and easy to use

Data entry with AN-SOF is easy. To edit a wire just click on it and an edit box will come up with the relevant dimensions. This is easier and quicker than searching through a spreadsheet to find a wire. Also, sources and loads can be seen graphically. To visualize output data, you can have quite a collection of plotted images to compare and save as you run through a design. Electromagnetic fields, currents, voltages, input impedances, VSWR, consumed and radiated powers, gain, directivity, and far more parameters can be computed in a frequency sweep and plotted in 2D and 3D graphical representations.

3D plots of radiation pattern and current distribution in AN-SOF.
Exporting Data and Plots from AN-SOF Antenna Modeling Software.

Accurate simulations

AN-SOF is based on the Conformal Method of Moments (CMoM) with Exact Kernel >. Old MoM codes suffer from many drawbacks and inaccuracies due to a linear approximation to geometry and the use of the so-called thin-wire Kernel, such as: divergent input impedance, poor convergence for curved antennas (helices, loops, spirals) and bent wires, and singularities that appear when two parallel wires are close to each other or close to a lossy ground plane. With the CMoM and an exact Kernel formulation we have removed these limitations and obtained the following advantages:

  • Decreased number of calculations and increased accuracy of results.
  • Decreased simulation time and computer memory usage, allowing us to model larger and more complex designs.
  • Ability to simulate from extremely low frequencies (circuits at 60 Hz) to very high ones (microwave antennas).