Mitigation of Mutual Antenna Coupling Effects for Active Radar Targets in L-Band

In order to realize a compact L-band transponder design for the calibration of spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) systems, a novel antenna was developed by DLR. As with previous designs for different frequency bands, the future transponder is based on a two-antenna concept. This paper addresses the issue of antenna coupling between corrugated L-band horn antennas, which are operated in close proximity. The antenna coupling is analyzed via simulations and measurements by utilizing specifically defined coupling parameters. Additionally, improvements to further lower the mutual antenna coupling have been designed, tested, and are described in this paper.