A low radar cross section antenna array based on a liquid metal metasurface

Abstract

Abstract A low RCS (radar cross section) slot array antenna based on a liquid metal metasurface is proposed. The metasurface consists of 6 × 6 nested ring‐shaped element. The inner ring with a checkerboard distribution can realise 180° ± 37° phase difference, which can effectively reduce the scattering performances for the slot array. The outer and inner ring together can excite more energy from the slot array, thus resulting in increased radiation gains. Therefore, by changing the layout of liquid metal on the metasurface, scattering and radiation enhancement modes can be switched. The measured results show that in the scattering mode, the RCS can be reduced from 8.1 to 17 GHz. While in the radiation enhancement mode, the proposed array with the metasurface can achieve a −10‐dB impedance bandwidth of 9.4–11.2 GHz (17.4%) with a maximum gain of 8.12 dBi. Compared with the slot array without the metasurface, the realised gain is enhanced by 1.2 dBi from 6.9 dBi. The measured results correspond well with the simulated ones.

Keywords

• antenna arrays
• metamaterial antennas
• radar cross sections
• radiation
• scattering