FIRST RF CORPORATION — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: AF161-145

Description

ABSTRACT: The Air Force is seeking a compact, wideband aperture for direction finding (DF) with a broad field of view, polarization discrimination, and an operating bandwidth of 2 to 18 GHz.FIRST RF Corporation proposes a breakthrough multi-port antenna design that provides broadband pattern and phase center stability that is comparable to a spiral antenna, but from a greatly reduced form-factor that provides an improved field of view, better efficiency, and provides unprecedented polarization discrimination capability from a single aperture. Moreover, the antenna is tailored to interface with next-generation multi-channel receivers by eliminating the need for beamforming hardware that has previously burdened both the size, weight, power, and cost (SWaP-C) and the efficiency of the legacy systems. The wide field of view spans at least 120 in both azimuth and elevation and the pattern stability allows a reduced look-up table for simplified calibration and improved platform independence. FIRST RF has also introduced two innovative broadband frequency-selective surfaces (FSSs) to incorporate into the design to further optimize the antenna patterns.; BENEFIT: In the last several years, the concepts of operation (CONOPS) for virtually all airborne battlefield operations have grown to intimately rely on the electromagnetic spectrum availability. As a result, there is an unprecedented urgency to ensure that our militarys Electronic Sense (ES) and Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) capabilities provided in part by direction finding systems can reliably and efficiently provide the awareness needed to protect the spectrum. As recent technological developments continue to systematically drive down the size and cost of the electronics supporting direction-finding sensors, there is a growing demand for lightweight and conformal antenna systems to enable these breakthroughs to be applied to a broader range of airborne platforms, including 5th generation fighters through small UAVs. Unlike electronics, however, antennas do not follow the principals of Moores Law, as their size and bandwidth are governed by fundamental physical limitations.Given the unique discriminators of FIRST RFs approach, including the improved efficiency, wide bandwidth, large field of view, and compact form-factor, these technologies are anticipated to play a critical role in advancing the capability of modern direction finding systemsincluding not only those systems used for military applications, but also in an emerging number of commercial applications.