Radar cross-section reduction for a microstrip patch antenna using PIN diodes

The authors investigate in this study using PIN attenuator diodes to reduce the radar cross-section (RCS) of a microstrip patch antenna. A simple design guideline and a useful loading scheme are developed. In the investigation, PIN diodes are equivalent to capacitances and resistances when diodes are reverse-biased and forward-biased, respectively. According to the magnitude distribution of the induced electric field under the patch for a specific incidence angle, the loading positions of PIN diodes are selected near to where the maximum electric field appears. First, three typical incident angles are separately considered. As a result, RCS reduction for the microstrip patch antenna is realised by utilising the variable resistance characteristic (energy dissipation) of PIN attenuator diodes. Secondly, the loading positions for that three incident angles are combined to realise RCS reduction over a large angular spatial region and within a wideband frequency range, and thus an electronically controllable low RCS status can be successfully realised. The proposed design guideline is demonstrated. It is worth mentioning that, by real-time adjusting the bias status of each PIN diode, the antenna realised gain as well as the relative bandwidth is well maintained when the antenna is at work.