Use of Absorption Cross Section to Predict Coherence Bandwidth and Other Characteristics of a Reverberation Chamber Setup for Wireless-System Tests

We present a method to predict the coherence bandwidth, delay spread, and power transfer function of a reverberation chamber. With an S-parameter measurement of an unloaded chamber and a measurement of one loading condition, the characteristics for other loading conditions can be predicted. The method is based on the absorption cross section of the absorbing material that is added to the chamber. We tested this method in two different reverberation chambers and for different types, shapes, and orientations of absorbing material. For all evaluated cases, the differences between the predicted and measured characteristics were below 6.2%.