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A Ka-Band Deployable Active Phased Array Transmitter Fabricated on 4-Layer Liquid Crystal Polymer Substrate for Small-Satellite Mount

2023; Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers; Volume: 11; Linguagem: Inglês

10.1109/access.2023.3291814

2169-3536

Dongwon You, Xiaolin Wang, Hans Herdian, Xi Fu, Ho‐Jun Lee, Michihiro Ide, Carrel da Gomez, Zheng Li, Jill Mayeda, Daisuke Awaji, Jian Pang, Hiraku Sakamoto, Kenichi Okada, Atsushi Shirane,

Antenna Design and Analysis

Lightweight and deployable phased arrays are important in Small-Satellite (Small-Sat) constellation systems to reduce price and increase link distance. This article proposes a Ka-band deployable active phased-array TX on a 4-layer liquid crystal polymer (LCP) board for a lightweight and high stowage rate solution to break through the trade-off between high antenna aperture size and small form factor in phased arrays. This article describes detailed designs of the phased array and its building blocks with the proposed 4-layer LCP substrate structure. Assembled with the beamformer ICs (BFIC), a Ka-band 8×4-element deployable active phased-array TX on the 4-layer LCP substrate is fabricated. The proposed deployable phased-array TX can steer the beam from -50° to 50°. The phased-array TX can drive 32-APSK DVB-S2 signal with a -28.7 dB EVM as well, revealing that the deployable phased-array TX performs with high phased-array performance. Furthermore, the TX achieved the lightest and thinnest phased array with 0.96 kg/m 2 areal mass and 0.9 mm thickness. This groundbreaking research sets the stage for the realization of affordable and user-centric satellite communication (SATCOM) in low-earth orbit (LEO).