The objective of the proposed effort is to carryout the design to the PDR level of a large diameter thermally insensitive lightweight, compactable, deployable VLF loop space antenna in the 20m diameter aperture range. The key to achieving highly accurate, large antenna diameter with low mass, low stowed volume operating at high RF frequency is the use of the L.Garde elastomeric shape-memory composite (SMC) material for the loop antenna and the Opterus Deployable Retractable Boom (DRB). The prototype parametric VLF antenna will be developed through PDR level and after CDR during Phase II, it should be ready for an in-space flight experiments.
