Beam-shaping with active phased array radars

As an aid to meeting the growing challenges of the littoral environment, the utilisation of pre-determined, fixed, complex antenna function templates by future active phased array radar systems is proposed. These templates would be designed such that the corresponding beam pattern characteristics meet a specific operational requirement. Here, a methodology is proposed for deriving the required complex antenna function template from a desired far-field beam pattern. Example cases are presented with particular emphasis upon the use of transmit-chain, phase-only template functions. For large arrays, the characterisation of these templates through Zernike decomposition is proposed as a means of allowing local generation close to element level.