Examination of the effectiveness of FF MARS in a CATR through electromagnetic simulation

• Published in: IET microwaves, antennas & propagation Vol. 12; no. 4; pp. 542 - 548
• Main Authors: Gregson, Stuart Fraser, Parini, Clive G, Newell, Allen C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: The Institution of Engineering and Technology 28.03.2018
• Subjects: antenna feeds; antenna radiation patterns; antenna testing; CATR; compact antenna test ranges; computational electromagnetic simulations; computational electromagnetics; cylindrical near‐field antenna test systems; electromagnetic wave reflection; electromagnetic wave scattering; far‐field mathematical absorber reflection suppression; feed spill‐over; FF MARS effectiveness; flexible EM simulation tool; measured FF pattern data simulation; measurement technique; modal filtering; planar antennas; planar near‐field antenna test systems; post‐processing technique; range reflection extraction; range reflections; scattering artefacts extraction; Special Issue: Selected Papers from the 11th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EuCAP 2017); spherical near‐field antenna test systems; range reflection extraction; computational electromagnetic simulations; modal filtering; CATR; range reflections; spherical near-field antenna test systems; FF MARS effectiveness; compact antenna test ranges; scattering artefacts extraction; feed spill-over; cylindrical near-field antenna test systems; electromagnetic wave scattering; computational electromagnetics; antenna testing; measured FF pattern data simulation; antenna radiation patterns; electromagnetic wave reflection; planar near-field antenna test systems; antenna feeds; measurement technique; far-field mathematical absorber reflection suppression; flexible EM simulation tool; planar antennas; post-processing technique
• ISSN: 1751-8725; 1751-8733; 1751-8733
• DOI: 10.1049/iet-map.2017.0595

For more than a decade now, a measurement and post-processing technique involving modal filtering, named mathematical absorber reflection suppression (MARS), has been used very successfully to identify and subsequently extract range reflections in spherical, cylindrical and planar near-field antenna test systems and far-field (FF) and compact antenna test ranges (CATRs). Much of the early work concentrated on verification through experimental testing; however, some additional validation was performed using computational electromagnetic (EM) simulations. These considered first FF and subsequently near-field cases. The recent development of an accurate, flexible EM simulation tool that enables the simulation of ‘measured’ FF pattern data as obtained from using a CATR has, for the first time, permitted the careful verification of the FF-MARS technique for a specified antenna under test (AUT) and CATR combination. This study presents simulated ‘measured’ FF antenna pattern data in the presence of a large scatterer and then verifies the successful extraction of the scattering artefacts. In addition to considering range reflections, feed spill-over is also treated. Results are presented and discussed.