65-6

WIDEBAND, HIGH-EFFICIENCY,CIRCULARLY POLARIZED SLOT ELEMENTS

R. M. Sorbello' and A. I. Zaghloul COMSAT Labs, Clarksburg, MD 20871

Slot radiators have been implemented with waveguide, microstrip and stripline transmission systems in numerous antenna designs [l-21. In most applications the slot provides modest element gain over a relatively narrow bandwidth. Additionally, most slot elements tend to radiate only linear polarization, thus necessitating external polarizing sheets for circularly polarized arrays. This paper will discuss a number of wideband, high-efficiency slot elements, that when appropriately fed are inherently circularly polarized. The elements have been derived by applying the principle of complementarity to a class of microstrip patch radiators that employ perturbation techniques to provide circular polarization [3].

Element Desian and Feeding Work on the development of a high efficiency, low-cost array was recently reported in the literature [4].The element cross section and construction for a linearly polarized array is depicted in Figures l a and 1b. The element consists of a slot cut in the top wall of a stripline transmission structure. Feeding of the element is accomplished via electromagnetic coupling, thus avoiding any direct interconnections. The array is formed by feeding a multitude of elements via the stripline divider. The interstitial area between the elements forms the top ground plane. Slots consisting of both circular or square (as shown) periphery have been used.
It has been demonstrated that by incorporating perturbation segments in conventional circular or square microstrip patch radiators, a circularly polarized element can be made when appropriately fed at 45" to the perturbation segment [3], Arrays using these elements have been built and demonstrated high polarization purity CP over a narrow band.

By employing both the principle of complementary and the Perturbation concept discussed above, a number of circularly polarized slot elements were developed. Figure 2 depicts the variety of slot elements that have been derived and tested. All involve perturbations on a basic circular or square/rectangular slot. The feeding of each element is by stripline with the feeding line placed at 45" to the perturbation segment. Arrays of elements were constructed as shown in Figure 1, where the linearly polarized square slot was replaced by the elements in Figure 2.

CH2864.2/8@/0000.1473 $1.00@198@ IEEE

1473

Circularlv Polarized Arrav Performance Using the above approach, numerous circularly polarized arrays of varying sizes have been designed and tested. Figure 3 shows the on-axis gain and cross polarization isolation for a 256 element array (.38m square) operating at Ku-band. The peak efficiency of this array exceeds 70 percent and greater than 60 percent efficiency is achievable over a 10 percent bandwidth. The cross polarization isolation exceeds 20 dB (1.8 dB axial ratio) over 500 MHz and is better than 12.5 dB (4 dB axial ratio) over a 10% bandwidth. In the 256 element array, all elements are fed in phase. With each element inherently CP, the polarization ellipses for each radiator will add in phase, and thus, limit the overall polarization purity of the array as a function of frequency. For applications where higher polarization purity is required over a broader bandwidth, techniques first introduced with microstrip radiators may be implemented to obtain improved polarization response over a broader band [5]. The technique involves feeding pairs of slot 90" out of phase and oriented 90" with respect to each other. Figure 4 depicts the measured performance for a .32 m (256 element) square array designed for improved polarization performance at Ku-band. The measured gain of approximately 31.7 dB over 800 MHz represents an efficiency of 58%. The demonstrated cross polarization isolation is better than 24 dB (1.2 dB axial ratio) over the 800 MHz band. This represents a marked improvement over the narrower band version shown in Figure 3. In the data presented the polarization of the source has been extracted from the date. The converted axial ratios are displayed in Figure 4b. Conclusion A number of novel circularly polarized slot radiating elements have been developed and incorporated into high efficiency broad band arrays. Arrays ranging from .32m (256 elements) to .7m (1024 elements) have been built and tested at Ku-band. In all cases, efficiencies of greater than 50% have been achieved over an approximate 10% bandwidth. Demonstrated polarization purity is quite good achieving better than 1.5 dB axial ratio over a 10% bandwidth. References [l] [2] [3]
R. C. Johnson & H. Jasik, Antenna Enaineerina Handbook, McGraw-Hill Co., New York, N.Y., Chapters 8 and 9, 1984. D.J. Sommers, "Slot Array Employing Photoetched Tri-Plate Transmission Line", IRE Trans. MTT, Vol. MTT-3, pp 157-162, March 1955. Haneishi, M. "A Design of a Back-Feed Type Circularly Polarized Microstrip Disk Antenna Having Perturbation Elements" Trans IECE Jpn 1981, J64-6, pp 612-618.

[4]

[5]

R. M. Sorbello, A. I. Zaghloul, J. Effland & D. DiFonzo, "A HighEfficiency Flat Plate Array for Direct Broadcast Satellite Applications", European Microwave Conference, Stockholm, Sweden, Sept. 1988, pp 295-299. Haneishi, M. "A Circularly Polarized SHF Planar Array Composed of Microstrip Pairs Element", Proceedings ISAP '85, pp 125-128.
RAOlATlNG SLOT I6b LINEIZP' iFEEOING PATCH 14
Y

FEED

'

~'..'* ~

'

L,,\\--\'\\\\\\'~'\~~~~ 'GROUND PLANE IO (a) Element Cross Sectlo"

Figure 1. Linearly Polarized Flat Antenna

(4

(e)

(f)

Figure 2. Circularly Polarized Slot Elements

1475

? .

10

5
1 ' 0

15

20
25
1

FREQUENCY (dB)

(a) Gain

FREQUENCY (GHz) (bJ 1sa1af~an

Figure 3. Gain and Polarization Isolation for a 256-Element Circularly Polarized Array

31

30

2 29
28
27
11

0
FREOUENCY IGHz)

13 0

la1 Gain

lbi Axial Ratio

Figure 4. Gain and Axial Ratio for a 256-Element Wideband Circularly Polarized Array

1476