Antenna Loss and Receiving Efficiency for Mutually Coupled Arrays

For phased arrays used in satellite communications and radio astronomy, high sensitivity is required, and minimizing antenna losses is critical. Losses for single antennas can be minimized using high conductivity materials. It is less well understood that loss for array antennas is also influenced by mutual coupling between array elements and the beamformer weights applied to the signal from each element. In this paper, we study the antenna loss and receiving efficiency for phased array antennas and focal plane phased array feeds. To better elucidate the physics of array antenna loss related to mutual coupling and beamformer weights, losses for a coupled array can be lumped into an array effective resistance similar to the loss resistance of an equivalent single antenna. Numerical results show that although the antenna loss for a single isolated array element is low, the array antenna loss can be significantly increased by mutual coupling, particularly for beams with a large scan angle.