Bae Systems Information and Electronic Systems Integration Inc.

Leonard Ruvinsky

Patrick D McKivergan

Zane Lo

Donald Spencer

Mark W Reed

Mahmood F Khosravi

Robert B Lombardi

Michael C Freeman

An octave bandwidth conformal cavity-backed slot antenna includes a ground plane with a number of different length slits that come together at the central feedpoint. The slit length varies from one-half a wavelength at the highest frequency at which the antenna is to operate for the short side to one wavelength at the highest frequency for the long side, with the proximal ends of the slits having a common feedpoint. Such slot antennas may be arrayed in a quad configuration. Because the trapezoidal envelope of the antenna induces the phase-center to shift with frequency, when two are arrayed with short sides adjacent, the spacing between them results in a phase center from one antenna to the next that is effectively within half a wavelength at all frequencies.

Multi-arm conformal slot antenna

An antenna and its associated components are consolidated in a small measurement box, and multiple tests are competed simultaneously, with a single vector network analyzer. This can be done by treating the 'Far Field' measurements (typically measured on antenna/RCS ranges) as another port of a larger passive network. After characterization of one ideal 'gold' unit (or a sample set of &#x201c;gold&#x201d; units), the S-parameters of subsequent units are measured in the same passive test box environment. The results of these subsequent tests are compared to the results of the &#x201c;gold unit's&#x201d; test, and if they are repeated to within some tolerance, electrical similarity can be proven.

Method and system for determining antenna characterization

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Merrimack, NH, United States of America

Leonard Ruvinsky