A Low Side Lobe Level Parabolic Antenna for Meteorological Applications.

A novel corrugated subreflector is developed to achieve sufficient side lobe level suppression for antenna systems used in meteorological applications. The subreflector operates at 9.41 GHz, with a 60 MHz bandwidth and an efficiency of more than 70%. Its structure is rotational symmetric and is suitable for parabolic antenna applications. It can be utilized in single-polarized or polarimetric radar systems. The pattern-forming property of the subreflector is achieved with corrugations of different depths. Analytical design formulas have been deduced by solving the aperture integral. The analytical formulas provide the initial geometrical configuration and the reference illumination pattern in the objective function to which full-wave electromagnetic optimizations are performed to obtain the final corrugation depths. The subreflector has been manufactured with CNC machining. The radiation characteristics are measured, and for both polarizations, suppression of -28 dB side lobe level has been achieved with a 1.2 m diameter main reflector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]