Prediction of radiation pattern of leaky-wave antennas

A theoretical analysis of the radiation pattern of dielectric image guide leaky-wave antennas is presented. Metallic perturbations in the antenna structure are considered as radiators of electromagnetic waves, and the array theory is applied to compute the radiation patterns by introducing the width of the perturbation element as a new parameter. The results obtained on the basis of this simpler theory show good agreement with experimental results reported earlier. Thus, the proposed analysis provides a more comprehensive and simpler mathematical approach for the computation of the radiation pattern of leaky-wave antennas compared to methods incorporating more laborious techniques.<>