Analysis and measurement of series fed phased array antenna employing multi-stage configured patch antennas with tunable reactance devices

摘要

Phased array antennas that employ tunable reactance on the series feedline are effective in reducing the feed loss and simplifying beam control. However, since the devices are directly attached to the microstrip, the reflection caused by the reactance on the feedline affects the antenna gain. This degrades the scanning range of the beam direction. In this paper, we propose a series fed phased array employing Multi-Stage Configured patch Antenna with Tunable reactance devices (MUSCAT). This antenna consists of some unit element groups, whose elements are placed close to each other, and have tunable reactance devices. Analyses and experiments show the unit element group configuration yields triple the phase shift compared with the conventional configuration, and a MUSCAT array antenna with four units of elements can steer the beam direction over a wide range.