Wide angle beam steering is a fundamental requisite for the new generation of millimeter waves communication systems. Mechanical scanning using two transmit-arrays (TAs) with independent axial rotation movements - known as the Risley prism approach - is being considered as a potential enabling technology for many cost-driven applications. There is an ongoing research effort to improve this solution, however, grating lobes are still a main limitation for the operation of these antennas. Herein, we show that this vestigial effect can be overcome by a co-design of the phase correction of the two rotating surfaces, instead of considering each TA as a separate “prism” (the conventional approach). The proposed generalized phase correction is compared with the conventional counterpart using a design example based on fully dielectric TAs. Experimental results confirm that the predicted grating lobes of the conventional design can be mitigated, corresponding to a significant reduction of the side lobe level (SLL) in the complete scanning plane. For the given full-dielectric Ka-band design example, is possible to scan up to 55 degrees with SLL<-8.3 dB and scan loss of -3.6 dB, whereas, with the conventional approach, the same scan implies SLL< -4.4 dB and a scan loss of -6.1 dB.

This work was supported in part by FCT and under FEDER—PT2020 partnership agreement Project "ADAM3D" PTDC/EEI-TEL/30323/2017 - LISBOA-01-0145-FEDER-030323, and Grant UID/EEA/50008/2020.

Millimeter wave antennas,Satellite mobile communication,Transmitarray,Scanning antennas,Beam steering,Rotating bodies,Sidelobe suppression,Dielectric antennas

• Physical Sciences - Natural Sciences
• Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering - Engineering and Technology