PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2008 IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ULTRA-WIDEBAND (ICUWB2008), VOL.

Differential Time Delay Patterns

for UWB Antennas
James S. McLean, Heinrich Foltz, and Robert Sutton

2
 +∞ 
Abstract—The time delay pattern for a UWB antenna is  ( E ( R, θ , φ , t ) ⋅ a (θ , φ )T (t − τ )) Rdt 
considered. Many different definitions of time delay are possible.
  (1)
Possibilities include (a) time delay for maximum correlation with ρ (θ , φ ) = max  − ∞+ ∞ +∞ 
a template function, either in terms radiated field or port-to-port τ 2
 
 − ∞ − ∞
2
transfer function, (b) time delays extracted from the linear phase T (t ) dt E ( R , θ , φ , t ) R 2
dt

part of a transfer function, and (c) time delays based on time-  
G
domain waveform features. Each of these three general where E ( R,θ , φ , t ) is the radiated electric field and
definitions may be computed by multiple means. The delays can
G
be absolute or differential, that is, taken relative to the respective a (θ , φ ) T ( t ) is the template function.
delay in a reference direction. It is shown that some of
definitions are equal under certain very restrictive conditions.
Example data is given for a broadband (1-18 GHz) double ridged As has been noted previously, there is ambiguity in the
horn antenna. determination of this quantity. First, the template
G
a (θ , φ ) T ( t ) to which the radiated field is correlated is not
Index Terms—antenna measurements, antenna radiation
specified and clearly many different situations calling for
patterns, time delay pattern, ultra-wideband antennas.
different templates can be envisioned. For example, in
describing antennas designed for short pulse reproduction
I. INTRODUCTION applications, it might be useful to use the time derivative of
the input voltage or current as the template. For
S EVERAL radiation pattern descriptors appropriate for UWB
antennas have been published including energy gain,
correlation coefficient, and correlated energy gain [1-9].
communications antennas, on the other hand, a useful template
might be the radiated field in a specified direction, such as the
bore-sight direction. This template gives some idea of how the
Here, we present a somewhat different descriptor, the
antenna will perform with fixed equalization, since fixed
differential time-delay pattern, which is computed using two
equalization can compensate only for one specific pulse
diverse approaches. Under strict conditions the differential
distortion.
delay patterns computed using these two approaches would be
similar. Via Parseval’s Theorem, the correlation may be carried out in
either the time or frequency domain, although truncation of
For a given antenna, the extent to which these two patterns the data will cause the two approaches to produce slightly
differ from one another gives some indication of the departure different results. It is also possible to compute the correlation
of the antenna’s behavior from ideal. The variation in the time from the antenna transfer function as defined in [1,7,11].
delay with angle may also be useful in determining the When the template is taken as the radiated electric field of the
uncertainty in precision radiolocation applications, and in antenna in a particular reference direction [8], and the
assessing beam scanning performance in circular or other non- normalized correlation pattern is expressed in terms of the
linear arrays. The time delay pattern may also aid antenna frequency domain antenna transfer function:
design by helping to identify and localize radiation  G G ∗ 
2
Re  a (ω ) ω 2 H • H 0 e − jωτ dω 
∞ 2

mechanisms.   − ∞   (2)
ρ (θ , φ ) = max  
τ  ∞ 2 2 G 2 ∞ 2 2 G 2

 −∞
a (ω ) ω H dω a (ω ) ω H 0 dω 
−∞ 
II. COMPUTATION OF TIME DELAY FROM CORRELATION where the reference direction is taken as (θ0,φ0),
H = H (θ , φ , ω )
Correlation from Antenna Transfer Function. The is antenna transfer function,
normalized correlation coefficient is defined in [3] by:
H 0 = H (θ 0 , φ 0 , ω )
is the transfer function in the reference direction, and a(ω) is
the input pulse (incident wave at the antenna input port) in the
James McLean and Robert Sutton are with TDK R&D Corp. frequency domain.
Heinrich Foltz is with the University of Texas-Pan American.

978-1-4244-1827-5/08/$25.00 ©2008 IEEE 9

PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2008 IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ULTRA-WIDEBAND (ICUWB2008), VOL. 1
Correlation patterns have been presented in [2,9-11].
Typically, the value of the correlation coefficient is presented
as a function of angle thus describing how different the
radiated fields of the horn are off axis compared to those on
axis. What is often not shown is the time delay required to
maximize the correlation. One can plot a pattern
τ(θ,φ), where τ is the value needed to maximize equation (2)
as a function of angle.
Correlation from Port-to-Port Transfer Function. A simpler
but less rigorous approach to defining a time delay is to
driectly use S21 data from a port-to-port antenna measurement.
The boresight S21 measurement versus frequency is converted
to the time domain, either directly as an impulse response, or
after multiplication by a theoretical frequency domain input.
This is used as a time-domain reference waveform f0(t):
f 0 (t ) = F −1{S 21 (θ 0 , φ 0 , ω )a (ω )} (3)
At any given angle θ,φ, off-axis one then calculates
f (t ) = F −1{S 21 (θ , φ , ω )a (ω )}
(4)
and then finds the time-delay τ to maximize
f 0 (t − τ ) f (t )dt (5)
The flaw in this approach is that this data contains information
from both the probe antenna and the antenna under test. For
the measurements reported here we used nominally identical
antennas for both transmit and receive. Although this method
is very different in principle from the one previously
described, the results shown in the last section are remarkably
similar.
Differential Time Delay Pattern. The time delay associated
with the correlation computed in the manner described here
will naturally be zero in the reference direction. More
generally, when the template function is different from the
response in the bore-sight direction, the definition of the time
delay can be generalized to a differential delay computed
between that required for maximization of the correlation in
the reference direction and that required for maximization of
the correlation in another direction.
III. COMPUTATION OF TIME DELAY USING LINEAR PHASE
VARIATION
A second approach is to find the time delay between two
antennas by examining the linear component of the phase
variation with frequency, and equating this to an equivalent
time. As in the case of correlation, there are multiple ways
one could define and measure the "linear component." The
first and most straightforward method is based on a least-
squares fit, the second approach is based on Hilbert
transforms.
10
Least Squares Approach From a port-to-port measurement
one can easily define a phase function
Φ(θ , φ , ω ) = arg(S 21 (θ , φ , ω )) (6)
Once the phase function is properly unwrapped, the linear
component can be defined as the slope of simple linear
regression. Unlike the correlation case, one can directly use
S21 data without worrying about the effect of the probe
antenna, as long as only the differential time delay pattern is
desired. Since the probe antenna is not rotated it only adds a
constant time delay offset that is removed in a differential
pattern referenced to the boresight direction.
One shortcoming of the least squares approach is that a
function that has true time delay, that is no first order
component in the Taylor series, can still have a non-zero
slope.
Bode-Hilbert Approach A minimum phase transfer
function contains, by definition, no linear phase component.
For any measured transfer function we can find an associated
minimum phase function using the Bode-Hilbert relation:
2ω ln H (ω ′ ) − ln H (ω )
∞
Φ m (ω ) =
π 0
dω ′ . (7)
ω ′2 − ω 2
For many passive, reciprocal antennas the difference in the
phase of the transfer function and the Bode-Hilbert derived
phase is a linear function of frequency:
Φ lin (θ , φ , ω ) = ∠H (θ , φ , ω ) − Φ m (θ , φ , ω )
(8)
≈ τ (θ , φ )ω
where Φ m (θ , φ , ω ) is the associated minimum phase
function. In Figure 1, the non-linear component of the phase
of the on-axis transfer function of the double-ridged horn
described in [11] as computed with a least-squares linear
phase extraction is shown. In the same figure the phase of the
associated minimum phase function as computed with the
Bode-Hilbert integral relationships is also presented. It can be
seen that the least-squares linear phase extraction
overestimates the linear phase.
The procedure is as follows: measure the magnitude and
phase of the antenna transfer function. From the magnitude,
compute a minimum phase function. Subtract the minimum
phase from the measured phase. Assuming the result is a
nearly ideal linear function of frequency (as has been the case
in our measurements), the time delay is computed as
∠H (θ , φ , ω ) − Φ m (θ , φ , ω )
τ (θ , φ ) = (9)
ω
As in the previous methods, the difference between time
delays computed in this manner for an antenna’s response in
the reference direction and its response in some other direction
provides a differential time delay pattern. This differential
time delay pattern, like the differential time delay pattern
computed for the maximization of the correlation, will
PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2008 IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ULTRA-WIDEBAND (ICUWB2008), VOL. 1
naturally be zero in the reference direction. Thus, the two
patterns can easily be compared. When the pulse shape
distortion is minimal, this time delay pattern will be very
similar to that computed by maximizing the correlation, but in
other cases it can be quite different.
200
150
100 least squares linear phase extraction
Bode-Hilbert linear phase extraction
Phase (degrees)
50
0 cutoff also leads to rapidly decreasing accuracy. Therefore,
-50
-100
-150
-200
2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Frequency (GHz)
Figure 1: Comparison of nonlinear phase computed using
least squares extraction of linear phase and Bode-Hilbert
extraction of linear phase.
The minimum phase transfer function involves the removal of
all of the linear phase from the transfer function. In the time
domain, this is equivalent to translating the response such that
it begins exactly at the origin; that is, would begin
simultaneously with the stimulus function. Of course, in the
presence of noise, it is occasionally difficult to discern
precisely when the time domain response begins. Thus, the
linear phase extraction using the minimum phase function
might be useful for providing a more accurate estimate of this
time.
IV. TIME DELAY FROM WAVEFORM FEATURES
Differential time delays can also be found from various
features on time domain waveforms, which can in turn be
found from either the antenna transfer function or directly
from S21 data. One possible choice is the time to the first
significant peak. However, this neglects the rise time and thus
the zero just prior to the first peak in the impulse response
could be considered to provide a better estimate of the
beginning of the time response. In the results shown here, the
S21 data on-axis and off-axis were converted to directly to
time-domain waveforms (a port-to-port impulse response).
The time to the desired feature on-axis is taken as the
reference. Unfortunately, as can be seen in [10], the impulse
response is difficult to work with due to artifacts from
truncation and noise. Thus, the first peak and the zero just
prior to the first peak in the step response are also considered
as indicators of the start of the time response.
V. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
In Figures 2 and 3, differential time delays as computed via
several different approaches from measured transfer function
data for the double-ridged horn described in [10] are plotted.
Measurements between two nominally identical horns were
made in an anechoic chamber at 1601 frequency points from
0.01 to 20 GHz. The antenna has a frequency null slightly
around 18.5 GHz, at which phase and relative amplitude data
have reduced accuracy. Below 1 GHz the ridged waveguide
truncated data was used in the calculations.
As can be seen, each of the approaches gives a slightly
different result. It is thought that the distance extracted using
the minimum phase transfer function is the most accurate, but
18 20 the variation in the data arrived at using the different
approaches is larger than one would expect. One reason for
this is an unfortunate coincidence involving the truncation of
the frequency domain data at 20 GHz and a very deep
transmission null in the transfer function of the horn at 18.5
GHz making extrapolation of the frequency domain data
difficult.
Some of the differential time delay observed is simply because
the antenna is not rotated about its center. As noted in [10], the
“center” of many practical antennas is not a uniquely defined
quantity. The data here was obtained by rotating the antenna
about a convenient point; since the antenna does not exhibit a
true static phase center—the phase of the radiated fields varies
with angle and frequency in such a way that phase center
defined from the curvature of the equi-phase surfaces would
be a function of frequency and both rotation angles. Such
behavior is typical for most broadband antennas.
The effective “center” of a UWB antenna has been the subject
of some discussion. In [6], a center is defined through
extrapolation of the far field amplitude decay. In [10,12], an
effective center is determined from the phase variation of the
far fields with distance. Specifically, a least-squares approach
is employed with measured transfer function data In [13], this
concept was carried further using Hilbert transform
techniques.
VI. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
The differential time delay pattern complements the
maximized correlation pattern and thus is part of the complete
description of a UWB antenna. It can be computed using
several approaches including the time required to maximize
correlation and also from the linear phase component
associated with the antenna transfer function. The Bode-
Hilbert integral relationships appear to be the most useful tool
for separating the transfer function phase into linear and
nonlinear components. However, when working directly with
time domain data, locating the beginning of the time domain
11
PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2008 IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ULTRA-WIDEBAND (ICUWB2008), VOL. 1

response might be more straightforward. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

In the hypothetical case in which the antenna does not This work was supported in part by the TDK R&D Corp., the
distort a pulse, but rather the pattern consists of linear phase or Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, NSF MRI Grant
delay, the two time delays (that derived from the time delay 0421352, and Army Research Office Grant W911NF-06-1-
required to maximize the correlation and that computed from 0420.
the linear phase component) will be exactly the same. This is
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Figure 3: Differential time delay plotted as a function of

the angle off of bore sight in the H-plane.

12