Antenna Design for TriHex: A Future Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity Radiometer Mission

ESA's Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission, is providing L-band observations of the Earth surface since November 2009. In preparation of a future L-band mission, ESA is involved in several technological activities intended to develop the components for an advanced L-band radiometer mission. In this context this paper presents the current design status of the antenna element that constitutes the first stage of the advanced L-band receiver unit that populates the aperture synthesis radiometer instrument.