Design and development of a dual operating mode microstrip patch antenna for unmanned aerial vehicle synthetic aperture radar

Abstract

Microstrip patch antenna has been designed and developed for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle based Synthetic Aperture Radar (UAVSAR). This antenna operates in C-Band at the frequency of 5.3 GHz with a bandwidth of 80 MHz. The radiation patterns of the antenna were specified to provide a desired scanned area for UAVSAR. The UAVSAR antenna was designed in the form of combination of 3 subpanels to allow dual operating mode (single antenna or dual antenna) selection. Two feed points are provided to the feeding network of each subpanel to reduce undesired power loss. The developed antenna prototype meets the performance requirements of UAVSAR system. It shows promising results in the UAVSAR flight mission conducted in Mersing area, Malaysia for both operating modes.