An Alternate Antenna Array Geometry for a GB-SAR System Used in Landslide Monitoring

Abstract

A Ground Based-Synthetic Aperture Radar System (GB-SAR), is currently employed for round the clock landslide monitoring in Italy. This paper proposes an alternate antenna array design for the sensor module of the existing GB-SAR system. In this paper, various linear antenna array configurations such as Broadside, Ordinary End-fire, Hansen Woodyard end-fire, Binomial, Dolph-Tschebyscheff and planar antenna array configurations have been analyzed using MatLab simulations. The parameters of antenna design, like Directivity and Half Power Beamwidth have been simulated and compared for the different linear and planar antenna array configurations. Based on the simulation results and tradeoff calculations between directivity and half power beam width, a planar antenna array geometry has been proposed as the most feasible design for the sensor module of the GB-SAR system. Further, peak side lobe ratio of the various antenna array geometries has been calculated for generating a quality image. These calculations also show that the proposed geometry is the best alternative for the sensor module of the existing GB-SAR system.

A novel planar antenna array for a ground-based synthetic aperture radar

“…In our previous work, an exhaustive study was carried out using Matlab simulations of an alternate antenna array geometry to replace the existing linear array of 12 horn antennas in MELISSA's transmitter module. The results revealed the feasibility of a 2×6 planar antenna array geometry (with 12 horn antennas), with a maximum value of HPBW of 113.5° [7]. This value of HPBW is comparable to that of the existing LISA system [2], demonstrating that a 2×6 planar horn antenna array configuration used in MELISSA's transmitter module can provide an area coverage in the range and azimuth directions equivalent to that of LISA.…”

“…This value of HPBW is comparable to that of the existing LISA system [2], demonstrating that a 2×6 planar horn antenna array configuration used in MELISSA's transmitter module can provide an area coverage in the range and azimuth directions equivalent to that of LISA. Further calculations were carried out to determine the PSLR for each of the alternate, linear and planar array configurations under study, and it was found that the 2×6 configuration yielded the lowest PSLR value of −12 dB [7]. This is a core requirement for efficient image processing in radar systems.…”

“…There is huge scope for improvement in the structure of the transmitter and receiver antenna arrays in the MELISSA system [3]. A 2×6 planar antenna array of pyramidal horns was proven in our earlier work to have a higher half power beam width (HPBW), better directivity and lower peak sidelobe ratio (PSLR) than the linear antenna array configuration of the MELISSA transmitter [7]. The next step in the enhancement of the transmitter module of MELISSA is to choose the best type of horn antenna for higher coverage.…”