High frequency vector sensor design and testing

Abstract

A new antenna design that exploits the simultaneous measurement of the complete electric and magnetic vector fields (vector sensor) has been designed, built, and tested experimentally. The sensor is designed for use in the high-frequency band (3-30MHz). Special consideration for potential operation near the ground/earth is incorporated into the antenna design, yielding a symmetric response amongst the individual field sensing components. The vector sensor consists of three orthogonally oriented electrically short dipoles as well as three electrically small orthogonal loop elements. Appropriate active impedance matching circuits transform the individual field sensors to a nominal 50 ohms for connection to a multichannel receiver system. Experimental measurements indicate that to first order the sensing components are sufficiently decoupled in spite of their relatively close electrical spacing.