The Gopher antenna: A new efficient design for ground penetrating radar

Summary In this article, we propose a new design we call the “Gopher antenna”: a patch antenna structure which does not require a resistive load and is therefore more efficient than the current ground-penetrating radar (GPR) antennas. When tested, it works well in a GPR application as low as approximately -25 dB of the application’s original transmit power. The Gopher antenna also meets the general requirements for the GPR antennas: a received wide spectrum and a good impulse response. Departing from the common designs (bow-tie dipoles and horn/Vivaldi structures), the Gopher antenna is a patch-antenna structure consisting of a quarter-wave feeder and a parasitic half-wave patch with no resistive load. The Gopher antenna has a directive radiation pattern, a good impulse response without distortion, a reasonable cross-polarization ratio, and a good radiated spectrum also when placed on the ground.