P. Pathak

Abstract: A summary of various high-frequency techniques is presented for analyzing the electromagnetic radiation from antennas in the presence of their host environment. These techniques provide physical insight into antenna radiation mechanisms and are found to be highly efficient and accurate for treating a variety of practical antenna configurations. Examples to which these techniques have been applied include open-ended waveguide antennas, horn and reflector antennas, and antennas on aircraft and spacecraft. The accuracy of these techniques is established via numerical results which are compared with those based on other independent methods or with measurements. These high frequency methods can be combined with other techniques, through a hybrid scheme, to solve an even greater class of problems than those which can be solved in an efficient and tractable manner by any one technique alone. >

Abstract: A new antenna, the planar inverted cone antenna (PICA), provides ultrawideband (UWB) performance with a radiation pattern similar to monopole disk antennas , but is smaller in size. Extensive simulations and experiments demonstrate that the PICA antenna provides more than a 10:1 impedance bandwidth (for VSWR<2) and supports a monopole type omnidirectional pattern over 4:1 bandwidth. A second version of the PICA with two circular holes changes the current flow on the metal disk and extends the high end of the operating frequency range, improving the pattern bandwidth to 7:1.

Abstract: The numerical approximation of Maxwell's equations, Computational Electromagnetics (CEM), has emerged as a crucial enabling technology for radio-frequency, microwave and wireless engineering. The three most popular 'full-wave' methods - the Finite Difference Time Domain Method, the Method of Moments and the Finite Element Method - are introduced in this book by way of one or two-dimensional problems. Commercial or public domain codes implementing these methods are then applied to complex, real-world engineering problems, and a careful analysis of the reliability of the results obtained is performed, along with a discussion of the many pitfalls which can result in inaccurate and misleading solutions. The book will empower readers to become discerning users of CEM software, with an understanding of the underlying methods, and confidence in the results obtained. It also introduces readers to the art of code development. Aimed at senior undergraduate/graduate students taking CEM courses and practising engineers in the industry.

Abstract: The method of moments (MM) represents a suitable procedure for dealing with electromagnetic scattering problems of arbitrary geometrical shape in the lower frequency range. However, with increasing frequency both computation time and memory requirement often exceed available computer capacities. Therefore a current based hybrid method combining the MM with the physical optics (PO) approximation suitable for three-dimensional perfectly conducting bodies is proposed in this paper. The hybrid formulation allows a substantial reduction of computation time and memory requirement, while the results are in reasonable agreement with those based on an application of the MM alone. Further improvement can be achieved for flat polygonal parts of the scattering body by a heuristic modification of the PO current density taking into account the effects of edges. As opposed to the physical theory of diffraction (PTD), no additional electric and magnetic line currents along the edges are necessary. >

Abstract: A time-domain version of the uniform geometrical theory of diffraction (TD-UTD) is developed to describe, in closed form, the transient electromagnetic scattering from a perfectly conducting, arbitrarily curved wedge excited by a general time impulsive astigmatic wavefront. This TD-UTD impulse response is obtained by a Fourier inversion of the corresponding frequency domain UTD solution. An analytic signal representation of the transient fields is used because it provides a very simple procedure to avoid the difficulties that result when inverting frequency domain UTD fields associated with rays that traverse line or smooth caustics. The TD-UTD response to a more general transient wave excitation of the wedge may be found via convolution. A very useful representation for modeling a general pulsed astigmatic wave excitation is also developed which, in particular, allows its convolution with the TD-UTD impulse response to be done in closed form. Some numerical examples illustrating the utility of these developments are presented.

Abstract: A relatively fast and simple method utilizing Gaussian beams (GBs) is developed which requires only a few seconds on a workstation to compute the near/far fields of electrically large reflector antennas when they are illuminated by a feed with a known radiation pattern. This GB technique is fast, because it completely avoids any numerical integration on the large reflector surface which is required in the conventional physical optics (PO) analysis of such antennas and which could take several hours on a workstation. Specifically, the known feed radiation field is represented by a set of relatively few, rotationally symmetric GBs that are launched radially out from the feed plane and with almost identical interbeam angular spacing. These GBs strike the reflector surface from where they are reflected, and also diffracted by the reflector edge; the expressions for the fields reflected and diffracted by the reflector illuminated with a general astigmatic incident GB from an arbitrary direction (but not close to grazing on the reflector) have been developed in Chou and Pathak (1997) and utilized in this work. Numerical results are presented to illustrate the versatility, accuracy, and efficiency of this GB method when it is used for analyzing general offset parabolic reflectors with a single feed or an array feed, as well as for analyzing nonparabolic reflectors such as those described by ellipsoidal and even general shaped surfaces.