Guided and Leaky Mode Characteristics of Solid Dielectric Horn: Analytical and Numerical Solutions

When a solid dielectric horn antenna is excited by the fundamental mode, one expects the radiation to be because of the fundamental mode only. Often this is not the case as higher order modes are also excited due to the large axial length or even due to physical defects. A metal wave guide to solid dielectric horn transition is proposed for eliminating the higher order modes. The equation for axial propagation constant of higher order guided and leaky modes is also proposed and is compared with numerical results.