Ultracompact and Conformal Magnetodielectric Antennas and Arrays for HF and VHF
Abstract
Novel approaches are needed to reduce the size, profile, number, and signature of antennas with significantly enhanced efficiency, particularly at HF and VHF. It has been shown recently by Diaz and collaborators that hesitivity, which is defined as the maximum magnetic conductivity, is directly linked to the radiation efficiency of magnetodielectric antennas. The higher the hesitivity, the higher the attainable efficiency in the magnetodielectric antennas. Further hesitivity improvement over state of the art is required since much higher antenna efficiencies are greatly desired. Magnetodielectric materials such as bulk ferrite ceramic materials and composites of magnetic powders in a polymer matrix have been developed and used for antenna miniaturization. However, these bulk magnetodielectric materials have limited relative permeability of 1~12. Based on their extensive expertise in RF magnetic materials and devices and their existing SBIR and STTR projects on relevant topics, the principal investigators (PIs) propose to demonstrate magnetic printed circuit boards (PCBs) with high permeability and high hesitivity values enhanced by >10x over state of the art by using spin-spray deposited thick ferrite films deposited on PCBs, and compact low-profile magnetodielectric antennas at HF and VHF enabled by the new magnetic PCBs with much higher radiation efficiency and ground plane immunity. These proposed magnetic PCBs with a relative permeability of 10~200 will enable ultra-compact magnetodielectric antennas at HF and VHF, and new power and RF electronic systems with significantly reduced SWAP-C (size, weight, power, and cost) with improved performance. These compact conformal magnetodielectric antennas are immune from ground plane effects over the human body, ship, or metal ground surface with reduced visual and RF signatures associated with the communication and radar systems, which provide great opportunities for new radars and communication systems on ships, marines, soldiers, aircraft, ground vehicles, and any other location where low profiles are required.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Feb 06, 2023
- Source ID
- N000142312187
Entities
People
- Xiaoling Shi
Organizations
- Office of Naval Research
- United States Navy