Coupling Effects in Ka-band Reflector Antennas

K a -band reflector antennas are of interest for satellite-based synthetic aperture radar (SAR) Earth observation missions. In practice, the antenna performance may decrease due to mutual coupling within the feed and with the reflector. Here, the impact of mutual coupling in K a -band reflector antennas is presented in terms of the active reflection coefficients, the accepted power and the radiation patterns. Mutual coupling in a center-fed and an offset-fed reflector antenna is investigated over the Ka-band range allocated for Earth exploration satellites.