Integrated Topside - integration of narrowband and wideband array antennas for shipboard communications

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The Integrated Topside (INTOP) Program is an Innovative Naval Prototype effort initiated by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) to develop wideband multifunction RF system technology that will enable increased functionality through the employment of shared hardware and software resources to execute the mission objectives. An Electronic Warfare/Information Operations/Communications (EW/IO/Comm) Advanced Development Model (ADM) is one of the prototypes being developed under the INTOP program. ONR is also developing low cost narrow band phased arrays as part of the High Throughput Networking Infrastructure (HTNI) program to support communications in the Common Data Link (CDL) frequency range. This paper explores the challenges and benefits that could be achieved through an integration of both technologies. The INTOP EW/IO/Comm program effort functionality encompasses the existing CDL spectrum with broader frequency coverage. Both the narrowband CDL array and the wideband INTOP array provide multi-beam array technology. However, the INTOP array provides greater flexibility in beam forming, interference nulling, and frequency coverage. Depending on the specific requirement for the communications link support, the CDL array set (four per ship) may provide as many as eight receive beams when used individually, or four beams when used in an elevation diversity configuration to mitigate multipath and other atmospheric effects. The INTOP receive array set (4 per ship) has the potential to support as many as 16 communication links or as few as four, when supporting the most distant communication links. As a combined asset, the receive antenna capacity addresses the Navy projections for the number of links to support Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) platforms. The transmit array is sized to similarly support the required number of links. In addition to the combined link support, the integration of the two arrays provides redundancy, multipath mitigation, frequency diversity, the potential to employ spatial separation to achieve the desired number of links within the existing frequency constraints, and the ability to allocate receive assets to enhance the frequency management of the ship to prevent interference and contention.