Low Cross-Polarization Ultrawideband Tightly Coupled Balanced Antipodal Dipole Array

TLDR: An ultrawideband, tightly coupled balanced antipodal dipole array (TC-BADA) with low cross-polarization characteristic is presented in this paper, where the antenna elements are fed by a tapered balun with six pairs of vias placed at the balun edges.

Abstract: An ultrawideband, tightly coupled balanced antipodal dipole array (TC-BADA) with low cross-polarization characteristic is presented. The proposed array achieves a low cross-polarization level by printing a pair of tightly coupled antipodal dipoles on two substrates to form a balanced radiating structure. The antenna elements are fed by a tapered balun with six pairs of vias placed at the balun edges. A meta-surface-based wideangle impedance matching (MS-WAIM) layer is designed based on the equivalent circuit model and current distribution, which improves the beam scanning ability and reduces the antenna profile simultaneously. The simulated results show that the proposed TC-BADA is able to operate over a 5:1 bandwidth (2.05–10.3 GHz) with active VSWR $0.51\lambda _{\mathrm {H}}$ at the highest operating frequency. A prototype of $16 \times 16$ array is fabricated and the central 8 $\times $ 8 elements are measured. Good agreement is achieved between the simulated and measured results.