On the use of Leaky-Wave Antennas for Amplitude Monopulse Comparison

Abstract

The performance of a single bidirectionally-fed scanning leaky-wave antennas for low-cost amplitude monopulse synthesis, is compared to the more conventional use of two tilted antennas. The main advantages and drawbacks are demonstrated in detail with a practical design for direction finding in the 2.4 GHz ISM band. It is demonstrated that leaky-wave antennas offer a much more compact design, which reduces the near-field zone for proximity sensing. However, the frequency beam-squinting must be considered for accurate performance in the entire operational bandwidth.