Noise characterization of a phased array tile

Abstract

This paper presents the results of a general analysis of phased array noise performance. It introduces an array quality factor that should be taken into account to obtain accurate noise measurement results, in case one of the calibration noise sources is a source in the far field of the array. The results have been applied to a one square meter tile of the Thousand Element Array (THEA, [1]), in order to determine the array noise budget.