Towards the understanding of the interaction effects between reflector antennas and phased array feeds

A computationally efficient numerical procedure has been developed and used to analyze the mutual interaction effects between an electrically large reflector antenna and a phased array feed (PAF). The complex electromagnetic behavior for such PAF systems is studied through a few simple and didactical examples, among which a single dipole antenna feed, a singly-excited antenna in an array of 20 dipoles, and a fully-excited array. These examples account for the effects of the ground plane, active loading (low noise amplifiers), and beamforming scenario, and are used to illustrate the differences between single-port feeds and PAFs.