#PHASED ARRAY RADAR DESIGN 360 DEGREE VIEW PATCH#
#PHASED ARRAY RADAR DESIGN 360 DEGREE VIEW SERIES#

#PHASED ARRAY RADAR DESIGN 360 DEGREE VIEW SERIES#

Nevertheless, in a series of tests beginning in 1964, the MAR demonstrated the characteristics needed to support the proposed NIKE-X deployment concept. This initial version, referred to as the MAR I, included only one hardened installation with its transmitter and receiver arrays. With authorization to proceed granted in July 1961, construction began in March 1963. Initially known as the Zeus Multifunction Array Radar, this system 'would feature a phased array arrangement with no moving parts and no necessity for a rotating antenna.' Designed to have four radar faces situated at 90 degrees, the system could cover 360 degrees in azimuth using a modulation scan to sweep the field. The concept of the MAR was first introduced in 1960 with a study to determine the feasibility of using a single electronically scanned radar to perform multiple functions - acquisition, discrimination and tracking. The test program was terminated in 1967 and the MAR was ultimately discontinued in 1969. With this and other accomplishments, the MAR provided a unique resource for radar innovations but it was never deployed. While not widely reported, this was a significant event documented in not only the command's history but also in larger volumes that sought to capture the history of the Army's strategic air and ballistic missile defense. This multiplex tracking demonstration successfully completed an operational milestone for the MAR program: Could a radar search and acquire possible targets and continue to operate in a search and discriminate mode while tracking the initial target? In this demonstration then, the MAR did just that - locate, identify and track five separate objects. The transmitter array is in the small dome on the right while the receiver array was housed in the large ce.įifty years ago on, April 27, 1967, the Multifunction Array Radar or MAR I, tracked five targets that had been ejected from a HIGHBALL rocket over White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico. Sadowy of Caltech for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.Multifunction Array Radar I, an innovative radar concept, constructed for the NIKE-X Project at White Sands Missile Range in the early 1960s. Chamberlain, Mauricio Sanchez Barbetty, and Gregory A. The interlacing of elements in a triangular grid for this prototype limits scan angles to less than 16 degrees, which is sufficient for the intended application. The unit cell prototype produced measurements that agree very closely to HFSS predictions. The unit cell was designed to interface with a WR10 test-fixture for testing purposes.

#PHASED ARRAY RADAR DESIGN 360 DEGREE VIEW PATCH#

This makes for a highly precise, low-loss antenna element.Ī metal patch unit cell prototype was recently developed at JPL for application to a cloud and precipitation scanning radar instrument. The elimination of dielectric in the construction of the antenna eliminates hysteresis losses and improves tuning accuracy (due to the uncertainty in the dielectric constant). Impedance matching is accomplished by adjusting probe position and by removing material from the corners of the patch. The patch elements are recessed in a shallow cavity, which helps to improve isolation. There is one probe for each orthogonal polarization, connected to a 50-ohm recta-coax interconnect. This concept is an adaptation of an antenna element originally designed for the Juno microwave radiometer for dual-polarized operation at W-band. The antenna elements are probe-fed, half-wavelength patches supported on a relatively large cylindrical column at the patch center. Antenna arrays comprising hundreds of elements at W-band can be fabricated using this process. Structures up to a millimeter in thickness, with dimensional control on the order of microns across multiple centimeters, are readily fabricated using this technique. Metal patch elements and interconnects are constructed using PolyStrata®, a wafer-level, multi-layer, micro-fabrication process. Left: Metal patch unit-cell prototype with US dime for scale. Using metal patch technology, the element and associated interconnect loss has been demonstrated to be 0.5 dB at 94 GHz, which represents an efficiency of 89%.

The isolation between transmit elements and receive elements has been demonstrated to be on the order of 25 dB or more, precluding the need for discrete isolator circuits. In this innovation, instead of trying to integrate isolators into the unit cell to separate transmit and receive signals, an interlaced triangular grid of metal patch elements has been developed. W-band active phased array antennas have a very small inter-element pitch (≈2 mm). NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California

Phased array radar design 360 degree view