SBIR-STTR Award

This study addresses a parametric analysis of technology alternatives resulting in the design of a wideband dual polarized HF antenna covering 3 to 30 MHz supporting transmit and receive functions with an instantaneous bandwidth of 10 MHz. A benchmark will be developed of conventional large size antennas to determine the best possible performance unconstrained by size. These candidates will then be reduced in size (1 to 10 feet) to determine tradeoffs compared to the benchmark antennas. Various technologies willbe applied in both receive and transmit to expand performance including: Receive - active circuitry; Transmit -fast switching antenna tuners - lossy impedance matching; a hybrid method using both lossy matching and switching in lumped elements to provide wider bands of coverage. A combination of computational electromagnetics software, numerical electromagnetics code, and advanced design system software will be used for antenna and circuit modeling. Matlab will be used for the Pareto optimization. The resulting design is an antenna with a few bands that would need to be switched with the antennas being truly instantaneous inside each band. A commercialization strategy is provided demonstrating how the resulting antenna design can be used in governmentand commercial systems.

This program is the next step in the development of a wideband dual polarized HF antenna covering 3 to 30 MHz supporting transmit and receive functions with instantaneous bandwidth of 10 MHz. A prototype design was developed in Phase I of this program. This design included the use of lossy impedance matching techniques for the horizontal and vertical transmit antennas. This ground based antenna design is easily packaged to be deployed in a tactical environment. In this Phase II program, the antenna elements will be prototyped and deployed for testing to obtain the antenna characteristics in numerous weather environments and ionosphericconditions. Using the results of the ground testing, an aircraft version antenna design will be developed using a combination of computational electromagnetics software, numerical electromagnetics code, and advanced design software. This antenna design will be applicable to large strategic aircraft. A commercialization strategy is provided demonstrating how the resulting antenna design can be used in government and commercial systems applications.