An ultra-wideband reflective polarization conversion metasurface and its application in RCS reduction

• Published in: Electromagnetics Vol. 44; no. 4; pp. 253 - 265
• Main Authors: Lin, Baoqin, Huang, Wenzhun, Guo, Jianxin, Wang, Zuliang, Si, Kaibo, Wang, Yanwen
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Philadelphia Taylor & Francis 18.05.2024; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Coding diffusion metasurface (CDM); Frequencies; Frequency ranges; Linear polarization; metasurface; Metasurfaces; Polarization; polarization conversion; Radar; radar cross section (RCS); Radar cross sections; Reflectance; Reflection; Stealth technology; Ultrawideband radar; Unit cell
• ISSN: 0272-6343; 1532-527X
• DOI: 10.1080/02726343.2024.2370273

In this work, an ultra-wideband reflective polarization conversion metasurface (PCM) is proposed at first. Because the PCM is an anisotropic structure that is symmetric with respect to both x- and y-axes, and the reflection phase difference under x- and y-polarized incidences is close to 180° in an ultra-wide frequency range, the PCM can achieve both linear polarization conversion and circular-polarization (CP) maintaining reflection in the ultra-wide frequency band from 8.3 to 41.3 GHz except for near the frequency point of 38.8 GHz. Moreover, when its unit cell structure is rotated by 90°, its cross-polarized reflection coefficient under LP incidence, together with the co-polarized reflection coefficient under CP incidence, will be changed by almost 180° in phase. Thus, based on the PCM, an ultra-wideband coding diffusion metasurface (CDM) is further proposed for radar cross section (RCS) reduction. The simulation and experiment results indicate that the CDM can achieve effective RCS reduction in the ultra-wide frequency band of 8.2-41.7 GHz under normal incidence with arbitrary polarization; in addition, an ultra-wideband RCS reduction can still be realized under oblique incidence with an incident angle less than 45°, which shows that the CDM is of good application value in radar stealth technology.