Situational Awareness (SA) / Direction Finding (DF), and secondarily Anti-Jam (A/J) capability for GPS/GNSS antennas on small airframes where wavelengths are comparable to size of the airframe itself present a significant challenge. Conventional Blade, Bicone, and Cavity-Back Spirals are ill-suited to these applications based on their size, weight, polarization, and/or pattern, and are generally difficult to array for DF purposes. In meeting this challenge, ThinKom proposes an innovative (yet proven) conformal ultra-wideband antenna element, named WaveTrap. Under this new SBIR topic, ThinKom proposes to develop a Quad-input Wavetrap that allows SA/DF to be accomplished in a single antenna, while also allowing ultra-wide bandwidths from 200MHz to 2GHz to enhance future A/J capability, and allow for a variety of others signals to be received. The Quad Wavetrap would incorporate directive azimuth beam capability offering enhanced gain through selectable azimuth (angle-of-arrival) discrimination.
Benefit: ThinKom""s conformal WaveTrap antenna technology can revolutionize commercial wireless communications by consolidating and""hiding""(integrating) many antenna systems, making WaveTrap particularly well suited for small ground vehicles, aircraft, and stationary wireless systems. WaveTrap can act as a bridging device, access point, inter-connecting various wireless networks, such as WANs, MANs and LANs, dramatically improving connectivity assurance for various types of handheld devices, and enhancing network flexibility for many types of user devices.
