Additive Manufacture of Nanocomposite Magneto-dielectric Conformal Antennas

In this effort, multi-materials additive manufacturing (AM) will be used to pattern custom-engineered magneto-dielectric (MD) nanocomposites, nanometal, and structural feedstock to realize reduced size conformal antennas with minimized radiation cross section (RCS). In the Phase 1 base effort, conformal microstrip patch antennas will be designed for about 2 GHz operation, using patterning of low-loss magneto-dielectric substrate materials. The antennas will be shown to be reduced in size by 50% compared to traditional antennas miniaturized solely through increased permittivity substrates. Prototype MD substrate materials will be fabricated and their electromagnetic (EM) properties characterized. The enhanced conformal microstrip patch antennas will be designed, fabricated, and tested. The antenna designs will include feeds and structural elements, made possible using multi-materials printing. We will then fabricate and characterize the performance of prototype conformal antennas. Preliminary environmental testing will also be performed.