Optical steering of a phased-array antenna based on fast delay-line switches

✍ Scribed by Xiaofeng Jin; Juan Liu; Xiaomin Liu; Xianmin Zhang

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2006
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 375 KB
• Volume: 48
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0895-2477
• DOI: 10.1002/mop.21631

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

A kind of architecture of optical steering of a phased‐array antenna (PAA) based on a fast optical delay‐line switch is proposed and experimentally studied. A 4‐bit fast optical delay‐line switch with switching speed of less than 30 μs is constructed using cascaded solid‐state optical switches. A distributed feedback laser integrated with electro‐absorption modulator is employed for radio‐frequency feeding and delivery. Our experimental system of transporting X‐band microwave signals over one antenna element shows a signal‐to‐noise ratio better than 55 dB and low crosstalk of less than −50 dB. The structure features a compact design, a low‐cost solution, a fast tilting speed, and true‐time‐delay beam steering. The proposed scheme of optical steering is very promising for wideband X‐band PAA applications. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 48: 1449–1452, 2006; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/mop.21631