Implementation of wideband digital beam forming in the E-band

This paper reports the test results of a small-scale prototype that implements a digitally beam-formed phased antenna array in the E-band. A four-channel dual-conversion receive RF module for 71-76 GHz frequency band has been developed and integrated with a linear end-fire antenna array. Wideband frequency-domain angle-of-arrival estimation and beam-forming algorithms were developed and implemented using Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) with Quadrature Phase-Shift Keying (QPSK) at 1 Gbps. Measured performance is very close to the simulated results and experimental data for an analogue-beam-formed array. This work is a stepping stone toward practical realization of larger hybrid arrays in the E-band.