Hybrid Subarray Using a New Concept of Feed for Advanced Antenna and Array Designs

Abstract

This work explores a hybrid subarray where a pair of dielectric resonator antennas (DRAs) are fed with identical phase and polarization by a resonant microstrip patch sharing a common grounded substrate. The elegance of the structure is to maintain the resonance features of the individual patch and DRA elements resulting in a large radiating aperture and improved gain. A C-band design promises 9.5-12.5 dBi gain indicating 5 dB improvement on average compared to that of the individual elements. Accurate deployment required for effective feeding of the DRAs in the subarray and the subarray side-lobe-level dependence on its aperture fields has been discussed. A comprehensive design guideline has been presented to enable one in accurately designing it in any specified frequency within the given limit. This antenna has been experimented to realize different array configurations. The linear array featuring zero inter-element spacing emerges as a compact high gain configuration with reduced number of feed requirements. Typically, a 1.75 subarray unit (5 element linear) to 2 subarray unit (rectangular) array is found to result in as much as 14.5 dBi peak gain. This design should find potential applications where high gain is required using minimal feeding structures.