RCS REDUCTION FOR A FSS-BACKED REFLECTARRAY USING A RING ELEMENT

Abstract

A novel RCS (radar cross section) reduction conflguration for a re∞ectarray antenna, employing the appropriate FSS (frequency- selective surface) as a ground, is proposed. The performance of a re∞ectarray element backed either by a solid metal ground plane or a frequency-selective surface is compared. To optimize the performance of the designed frequency-selective surface, a parametric study is carried out using Ansoft HFSS. Then, a prime-focus FSS-backed re∞ectarray is fabricated and tested. The measurements demonstrate that the gain of a FSS-backed re∞ectarray is about 0.5dB lower than its counterpart backed by a solid ground plane. The RCS is nearly the same at the operating band of 10GHz, while out of this band the FSS-backed re∞ectarray reduces the RCS strongly, especially at 1GHz with the reduction up to 20dB. Compared with the RCS reductions obtained in the other papers, the FSS-backed re∞ectarray using a ring element can also obtain a good result.