Design of patterned fluorine-doped tin oxide for radome de-icing heater

Abstract

We suggested microwave transparent heaters by using a patterned fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO). The pattern is a continuous waveform, and the DC voltage is applied for Joule heating. While the pattern of conductive materials is mostly associated with electromagnetic behavior, this study extends its potential application to thermodynamics. Especially for radome applications, the microwave transparent heater is able to remove the ice accretion on the radome surface in order to prevent not only aerodynamic instability, but also communicative failure. The characteristics of the RF transmission and saturation temperature, which are the key parameters of FTO as a conductive material, were investigated by using numerical simulation and an experiment. A reasonable agreement between the measurements and the numerical simulations was achieved. This multi-functional waveform-patterned FTO has both X-band transparency and Joule heating performance so that it can be a cornerstone for electromagnetic and thermal applications.