Development and Optimization of Innovative 3D “Confetti” Miniature Antennas for HF Communications

Aerotonomy, Incorporated, and our research institution partner Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) propose to Design and optimize a miniature 3D fragmented “Confetti” antenna for application to broadband voice communications over the frequency range of 2 to 30 MHz. The Confetti antenna is an arrangement of partially interconnected wires on a three-dimensional grid. The concept is similar to the Fragmented Aperture Antenna (US Patent 6,323,809), but the Confetti antenna is 3-dimensional, whereas the Fragmented Aperture is two-dimensional. The antenna is designed using automated optimization to meet specifications that depend on the intended application of the antenna. The method and generality of this class of antennas promise to provide performance that approaches the best that is theoretically possible for a wide range of applications. The goal for this research is to design an antenna of only 500 cm3 volume and only 30 cm in any dimension that can be tuned to operate efficiently over 2 to 30 MHz with up to 150 W transmission power, while achieving 3 KHz instantaneous bandwidth. While this combination of goals is ambitious, we believe this innovative antenna can offer performance that will move the state-of-the-art significantly closer to these ideals.BENEFITS: There are many obvious opportunities for commercialization of this technology in the DoD. HF communications systems are used extensively by all branches of the U.S. armed forces, as well as Homeland Defense, intelligence agencies, civilian law enforcement organizations, and resource management organizations (i.e. Forest Service), as well as private industry and amateur radio operators. The optimized, extremely compact multi-modal Confetti antenna technology that will be developed during this project represents a revolutionary step in broadband antenna system performance while meeting the goals of minimal size. The small size of these antennas will allow increased distribution of effective communications capabilities to users in the field, thereby benefiting a large group of potential users. In the private sector, there are a number of companies engaged in the development and deployment of advanced, small scale communications systems that could benefit from the integration of antennas based on Confetti technology to their product lines.