Design and Analysis of Light-Weight Deployable Mesh Reflector Antenna for Small Multibeam SAR Satellite

This study presents the development of deployable mesh reflector antenna for mini satellite equipped with synthetic aperture radar (SAR) payload. The reflector is light-weight with total mass of less 8 kg for 3.35 meters diameter. The SAR system operates in X-band and is based on digital beam-forming (DBF) technique. Both electromagnetic and mechanical/structural analysis of the original suggested design of the deployable reflector antenna installed on a satellite bus is performed. The results of this analysis indicate the feasibility of using proposed mesh reflector antenna for SAR payload at mini satellites.