Measured currents and charges on thin crossed antennas in a plane-wave field

Abstract

Measured distributions of current and charge per unit length on electrically long and thin crossed antennas over a ground plane are displayed for five sets of lengths that locate the junction at minima and maxima of charge and include resonant and antiresonant combinations of lengths. The currents are induced by a normally incident plane electromagnetic wave with its electric vector parallel to one of the mutually perpendicular antennas. Attention is given to the behavior of currents and charges near the junction where Kirchhoff's current law and equality of charges per unit length are observed. For purposes of physical understanding a zero-order explanation of the distributions of charge per unit length and current is given in terms of resonant and forced components.