Circularly Polarized Metasurface Phased Array Antenna System With Wide Axial-Ratio Beamwidth for LEO Mobile Satellite Communication
Yingsong Zhang, Wei Hong, Zhidan Ding, Long Yang, Cheng Zhu, Yun Hu
Abstract
In this article, a millimeter-wave LHCP <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$1\times32$ </tex-math></inline-formula> with a dummy on both sides phased array antenna is proposed. Multilayer structure and single feed are employed. The antenna patch adopts a <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$3\times $ </tex-math></inline-formula> 3 metasurface. The measured impedance bandwidth is 20%, ranging from 22.5 to 27.5 GHz. The axial ratio (AR) bandwidth with an AR level < 3 dB achieves 3.35 GHz ranging from 24.15 to 27.5 GHz. Relative 3-dB AR bandwidth reaches 13.4%. A total of 37 beams were measured in the anechoic chamber. The results show that whether the phased array antenna system serves as transmitter or receiver, the 3-dB beam angle coverage at 26 GHz reaches from −42° to 45° at <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\varphi $ </tex-math></inline-formula> = 0° and from −42° to 42° at <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\varphi $ </tex-math></inline-formula> = 90°. The 3-dB AR beam angle ranges from −80° to 89° at <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\varphi $ </tex-math></inline-formula> = 0°, and from −45° to 45° at <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\varphi $ </tex-math></inline-formula> = 90°. Based on this linear array, it is easy to expand to circular polarization planar wide-angle scanning phased array. The antenna system realizes circular polarization with wide angle wide AR beam scanning, which can be used in low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite communication system.