Multifunctional Scattering Antenna Array Design for Orbital Angular Momentum Vortex Wave and RCS Reduction

Zan Kui Meng,Wen Yue Wei,Xiang Fan Zhang,Yan Shi

doi:10.1109/access.2020.3001576

Zan Kui Meng, Wen Yue Wei + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1109/access.2020.3001576

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Abstract

In this paper, a multifunctional scattering antenna array has been proposed to generate orbital angular momentum (OAM) vortex scattering wave and meanwhile reduce antenna radar cross section (RCS). Theoretical analysis for integration of the RCS reduction and the OAM wave is given, and a circular antenna array composed of a dual polarized microstrip antenna and a tunable connection line network is designed. By adjusting the ON/OFF state of the PIN diodes embedded in the connection line network, the OAM scattering waves with the modes of $l=1$ and $l=2$ are independently generated, and accordingly in-band RCS reduction of a circular patch antenna with an increase of the antenna gain over 2 dB is achieved. A multifunctional prototype antenna array is fabricated and measured. Simulated and measured results demonstrate -10dB RCS reduction and the OAM scattering waves with the tunable modes in the frequency band of 9.37~9.8 GHz.

Highlights

Orbital angular momentum (OAM) vortex waves characterized by an azimuthal phase dependence of exp(ilφ), in which φ is the azimuthal angle and l is an integer known as the mode number, have caused tremendous research interests in scientific communities due to its promising ability in wireless communication
In the orbital angular momentum (OAM) measurement, a standard horn antenna is placed at z = 175 mm in front of the proposed multifunctional array, and a probe with an orthogonal polarization at the observation plane of z = 400 mm samples the phase of the electric field in a sampling space of 0.4 mm
The design concept is based on the theoretical analysis that the far field of the OAM vortex wave has a null amplitude along broadside direction

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Orbital angular momentum (OAM) vortex waves characterized by an azimuthal phase dependence of exp(ilφ), in which φ is the azimuthal angle and l is an integer known as the mode number, have caused tremendous research interests in scientific communities due to its promising ability in wireless communication. The metamaterial/metasurface inspired reconfigurable antennas and arrays have been proposed to design the OAM vortex waves with tunable beams [11], [12] and tunable modes [13]–[16] for dynamic communication environment. Meng et al.: Multifunctional Scattering Antenna Array Design for OAM Vortex Wave and RCS Reduction. A multifunctional antenna array has been designed for the first time to simultaneously generate the OAM vortex scattering wave and reduce antenna RCS. Simulation and measured results are given to demonstrate the good performance including the scattering OAM wave with tunable modes, the in-band RCS reduction of the reference antenna, and the increase of the reference antenna in the operating band of 9.37∼9.8 GHz. II. A helical phase distribution will lead to the RCS reduction in the broadside direction

MULTIFUNCTIONAL ANTENNA ARRAY DESIGN

Findings

CONCLUSION