This document discusses a means of providing the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS) with a set of circularly-polarized, amplitude-sensing monopulse patterns suitable for acquiring and tracking user spacecraft at Ku-band (15,0 GHz). The possibility of increasing the less than 0.4-degree half-power beamwidth of the data beam to almost 1.0 degree during the acquisi¬tion phase is predicated on the use of feeds situated in the first bright-ring of the Airy diffraction structure. A complex-vector simulation equivalent to the Kirchhoff-Kottler or Franz formulations is used to compute transmitted and received field information for a dual-reflector (Cassegrain) antenna configuration in a three-dimensional space.
展开▼
