A Tileable, Dual-Polarized, Planar Ultrawideband Modular Antenna Array Solution for Modern Airborne Applications

The Advanced Aperture Solutions team(AAS) at L3Harris Technologies presents a 256-element tileable, dual-polarized, 6:1 bandwidth Planar Ultrawideband Modular Antenna(PUMA) array designed to operate across the L, S, and C radio bands. This multi-octave PUMA phased array is designed to provide an electronic scanning range from −45° to +45° in azimuth and elevation for receive-only applications. A light-weight profile design and simplified fabrication process provides size, weight, power, and cost(SWaP-C) benefits for airborne applications. The array is duplicated and placed side-by-side to the original to create a 512-element array in a $2\times 1$ aperture ensemble. Simulated results show a promising tileable antenna array solution that can be modularly manufactured to meet varying gain requirements as needed.