Mehrstrahl-phasengesteuerte Antenne und damit verbundenes Verfahren

• Main Authors: LEE, JAR J, STEPHENS, RONALD R
• Format: Patent
• Language: German
• Published: 27.02.2003
• Edition: 7
• Subjects: ANTENNAS, i.e. RADIO AERIALS; BASIC ELECTRIC ELEMENTS; ELECTRICITY

Antenna structures (20;100;120) are provided which facilitate the simultaneous radiation of multiple antenna beams (82,83). The structures include photonic manifolds (30,32) that define equal-length optical paths (48) and other optical paths (59) whose lengths progressively change by a selected length ( DELTA L). The manifolds conduct signal pairs (ss,sr) to radiative modules (28). Each signal pair includes a frequency-swept scanning signal (ss) and a reference signal (sr) whose frequency is a selected one of the sum and the difference of the frequencies of the scanning signal (ss) and a respective operating signal (s0). Subsequently, the scanning signals are mixed (55) with the reference signals (sr) and filtered to recover phase-shifted versions of each respective operating signal (s0). The phase-shifted versions are radiated to form multiple radiated beams (82,83) wherein each beam is scanned by changing the frequency of its respective scanning signal (ss). The frequency of the scanning signals (ss) is selected to avoid generation of spurious radiated signals.