Flat Lens Antenna Technology for Compact UHF/VHF Antennas

The way to advance the state-of-the-art in compact UHF/VHF antenna design is to approach it from an unconventional paradigm. Over the last few years, CTG has developed a line of near-field spot probe microwave antennas that have found effective use as Tier-1 sensors in a variety of applications. Integral to CTG’s design is the incorporation of dielectric materials optimized as part of the antenna design. This combined dielectric/metal antenna results in a wide bandwidth but still very compact antenna. Taking this probe antenna as design inspiration, CTG proposes a new concept in UHF/VHF sensors: Flat Lens Antenna Technology (FLAT). This new paradigm draws inspiration from CTG’s previous AMMP technology, but with several new innovations that reduce size and weight without sacrificing performance. Rather than trying to reduce the antenna thickness in the propagation direction, the FLAT design instead shrinks the antenna perpendicular to the propagation direction. Maintaining a reasonable length parallel to propagation allows the FLAT antenna to still have sufficient directivity for field-deployable diagnostic applications. More importantly the successful Phase I prototype demonstration shows that FLAT will enable antennas that are smaller and lighter than current state-of-the-art horns, but with similar performance.