Additive Manufacturing of Luneburg Lens Antennas Using Space-Filling Curves and Fused Filament Fabrication

Abstract

We demonstrate a new method for realizing Luneburg lens antennas with nearly continuously graded permittivity profiles in three dimensions. The method combines fused filament fabrication, a nearly ubiquitous additive manufacturing technique, with an effective media approach that employs space-filling curves. We experimentally validate our design methodology by fabricating and characterizing two Luneburg lenses designed to operate at separate frequency bands (26-40 GHz and 70-110 GHz) with antenna gains of 20 and 24 dBi, respectively. The results demonstrate good agreement with rigorous electromagnetic simulations. We also demonstrate the ability to passively beam steer over a wideband of operation (26-40 GHz and 70-110 GHz) with less than 0.5% power loss due to dielectric material losses within the Luneburg lens.