Miniaturized ultra‐wideband printed dipole array for electronic warfare applications in unmanned aerial vehicle systems

Abstract

AbstractThe advances in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and their applications in various areas of military, communications made the researchers focus on the design of compact, wide beam, lightweight antennas. In this article, a novel miniaturized printed dipole antenna with quasi rhombus shape exhibiting an Impedance bandwidth of 113% (within 2:1 VSWR for the frequency range from 6.3 to 23 GHz) is presented. The length and width of the antenna element in terms of λ6.5 considered at the resonant frequency of 6.5 GHz is 0.347λ6.5 × 0.369λ6.5 (16 mm × 17 mm). Design equations are included to carefully match the impedance at every segment of the antenna. The optimized element is fabricated to confirm the finding from the analysis. The wideband characteristics of the antenna with good cross‐polarization levels, stable radiation patterns and matching performance of element makes it suitable for various EW applications in UAV systems. The optimized linear antenna array with eight elements is fabricated and tested to evaluate its suitability for broadband applications. Various antenna parameters such as reflection coefficients, bandwidth, radiation patterns are measured and compared with computed results to validate its suitability for EW applications. Miniaturization of antenna size finds the suitability of antenna to be used for smaller platforms having smaller surface similar to UAV. The wideband performance from a single antenna/array is useful for multitude applications. Some of the areas of application are shared aperture; communication support measure; SATCOM; data link; electronic support measure; radar warning receiver applications.