A New Method to Mitigate Communication Blackout Based on Sandwich Structure

It is called communication blackout when the communications between vehicle and ground have been breaking down. The blackout occurs while the plasma frequency of plasma layer is higher than a radio wave frequency. It has greater transmission coefficient in window frequency when the electromagnetic wave propagates in the sandwich structure compared with the media-plasma structure. So a sandwich structure of plasma-media-plasma is proposed to mitigate communication blackout in this paper. The theory of electromagnetic wave propagation in layered-homogeneous media is applied to study the method systematically in the paper. Media thickness and internal plasma thickness which have an effect on propagation coefficients in window frequency are discussed in detail. A horn antenna and sandwich structure are simulated to verify the method.