Design of Linear Polarization-Adjustable Spherical Array Antenna

Abstract

In this letter, we propose a linear-polarization direction adjustable spherical array antenna. A spherical surface is subdivided into a 92-faced polyhedron. The linear-polarized E-shaped slot microstrip antenna is placed on the subdivided planar polygon. By rotating the antenna elements on the subdivided planes, the polarization directions of these antenna elements can maintain relatively consistent according to the desired direction. To avoid beam distortion during large-angle scanning, we only activate the antenna elements located near the main beam direction. Simulated and measured results both confirm that the spherical array antenna can generate stable steering beams with gain variation of less than 2 dBi when the scanning angle θ₀ varies from 0° to 90°. Additionally, the cross-polarization level remains below 16.3 dBi compared with the copolarized maximum gain. The proposed design can provide a reference for radar and military wireless communication platforms in the future.