Abstract
A practical procedure to reduce the back lobe level of microstrip antenna arrays is presented in this paper. The novel concept consists in the design of the radiators asymmetrically positioned with respect to the ground plane. In order to validate this technique, a four-element linearly-polarized array is designed in the HFSS software and a prototype is manufactured. Furthermore, the design of beamforming circuit to achieve broadside radiation and -20 dB side lobe level is detailed. Very good agreement between simulated and experimental results is obtained. Although the technique is presented for linearly polarized arrays, it is general and can also be applied in the circularly polarized ones.
Highlights
Microstrip antenna arrays are widely used in global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) and communication systems due to its low profile characteristic, conformability, lightweight and low cost
To validate the explanation above described with respect of asymmetric radiation pattern, the far field E-plane of the array is plotted in Fig. 10 for the asymmetrical and symmetrical ground plane conditions
The topology of the antenna array with beamforming circuit is a multilayer structure presented in the Fig. 11, where the circuit is positioned behind the antenna ground plane
Summary
Microstrip antenna arrays are widely used in global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) and communication systems due to its low profile characteristic, conformability, lightweight and low cost [1] These arrays, when composed by linearly polarized patches in side by side configuration [2], exhibit a high back lobe level [2]-[4] due to asymmetric E-plane radiation pattern [5]. This undesired behavior allows that multipath signal propagation remain a dominant cause of error in differential positioning system [6]. According [7] a FBR better than 20 dB is the goal of this work
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