A Multipolarized Planar Phased Array for LEO SATCOM Applications

This letter presents a scalable multipolarized planar phased array for the low earth orbit satellite communication application. A dual-polarized aperture-coupled patch element antenna is proposed for designing the array, which can provide dual-linear polarization (LP) and dual-circular polarization (CP). The rotated feed technique is adopted to reduce the cross-polarization level. By using 8-channel beamformer chips and the multilayer printed circuit board technology, a phased array prototype with good electromagnetic shielding performance, high integration, and low cost is designed, fabricated, and measured. For dual-LP radiation, it steers up to the scan angles (±50°) with a scan loss less than 3.5 dB, and a cross-polarization level lower than −30 dB in azimuth/elevation plane and −15 dB in diagonal plane. For dual-CP radiation, it steers up to the scan angle (±50°) with a scan loss less than 3 dB and an axial ratio less than 3 dB. The phased array developed in this letter can be scaled to larger arrays and provides feasibility for the production of low-cost phased arrays.