HTSC RECEIVE PHASED ARRAY ANTENNA

SIGNIFICANT SIMPLIFICATION OF MICROWAVE PHASED ARRAY ANTENNA SYSTEM ARCHITECTURES CAN BE ACHIEVED WITH HTSC DEVICE TECHNOLOGY. ELIMINATION OF THE LOW NOISE AMPLIFIERS (LNAS) CAN BE ACCOMPLISHED THROUGH REPLACEMENT OF THE GAAS PHASE SHIFTERS WITH LOW LOSS HTSC COMPONENTS. A REDUCTION IN COMPLEXITY LOWERS BOTH SYSTEM WEIGHT ANDCOST. KEY TO HTSC TECHNOLOGY INSERTION IN PHASED ARRAY ANTENNAS IS THE DEVELOPMENT OF A NOVEL MULTIPLE BIT HTSC PHASE SHIFTER. PHASE I FOCUSES ON THE DEMONSTRATION OF A LOW LOSS HTSC SWITCH (THE CRITICAL COMPONENT OF THE HTSC PHASED ARRAY SYSTEM) AND THE EVALUATION OF THEORETICAL HTSC PHASED ARRAY ANTENNA SYSTEM DESIGNS FOR DIRECT INSERTION INTOEXISTING OR NEXT-GENERATION PLATFORMS. IN PHASE II THE HTSC PHASE SHIFTER WILL BE BUILT AND TESTED, A SPECIFIC SYSTEM FOR INSERTION WILL BE IDENTIFIED, THE HTSC PHASED ARRAY ANTENNA SYSTEM WILL BE DESIGNED, AND ESTIMATES OF THE DEVELOPMENT AND DEMONSTRATION COSTS WILL BE FINALIZED. SYSTEMS INSERTION WILL BE ACCELERATED THROUGH CLOSED INTERACTIONBETWEEN ATM, A LEADER IN THE PRODUCTION OF LOW SURFACE RESISTIVITY HTSC FILMS AND HIGH Q MICROWAVE DEVICES, AND THE HARRIS CORPORATION, A SYSTEMS INTEGRATOR WELL KNOWN FOR ITS WORK ON PHASED ARRAY ANTENNAS. ANTICIPATED BENEFITS/POTENTIAL COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS - THE PROPOSED HTSC PHASE SHIFTER DEVICE TECHNOLOGY HAS THE POTENTIAL TO BE UTILIZED IN BOTH MILITARY AND CIVILIAN MICROWAVE SYSTEMS. DEVELOPMENT OF HTSC-BASED RECEIVE PHASED ARRAY ANTENNA SYSTEMS IN ADVANCED HIGH FREQUENCY COMMUNICATION, RADAR AND ELECTRONIC WARFARE SYSTEMS WILL ACHIEVE BOTH PERFORMANCE AND COST ADVANTAGES RELATIVE TO CONVENTIONAL ANTENNA SYSTEMS.