Cylindrical phased array antenna system to produce wide open coverage of a wide angular sector with high directive gain and strong capability to resolve multiple signals

摘要

A cylindrical phased array antenna system capable of scanning at rates faster than the information rate of signals being received so that no information is lost by the scanning process. The array is configured to add the capability to provide multi-dimensional separation of multiple signals and to eliminate the sensitivity loss due to sampling. The cylindrical phased array is comprised of the means to decompose the distribution of current on the radiator elements caused by wave incidence into component signals which are the Fourier spatial harmonics of the distribution, heterodyne means to differentially phase shift these component signals at rates exceeding 4&pgr; radians per cycle of the highest frequency present in the information content of the incident wave, and means to form multiple complex-weighted sums of the component signals.