Beam Steering Enhanced Antenna Array

To address the Air Forces need for innovative, cost-effective techniques for antenna electronic beam steering for small missile radar seekers, Physical Optics Corporation (POC) has developed a new electronic Beam Steering Enhanced Antenna Array (BEAST). This novel design requires only one phase shifter for an N-element antenna and also utilizes POCs low-power-consumption, high-power-handling, low-loss, barium strontium titanate varactor technology. As a result, the BEAST technology offers reliable, low size, weight, and power (SWaP), lower-cost electronic beam steering with limited constraints on the small missile radar seeker, which directly addresses the Air Force requirements. In Phase I, POC demonstrated the feasibility of BEAST by fabricating a first-generation BEAST antenna and phase shifter; the antenna was tested for transmission, gain, and polarization at different elevation angles. The phase shifter circuits were measured and tested for insertion loss, return loss, and phase shift. The results showed high gain >7 dBi per element, low insertion loss <3 dB, and at least 200 deg of phase shift. In Phase II, POC will optimize the BEAST design, refine and mature the phase shifter, fabricate and integrate antenna subsystems, test and evaluate the BEAST prototype system, and make it available to the AFRL for further testing.