Title :
Active antenna development for the SKA
Author :
Jiwani, Aziz ; Juswardy, Budi ; Padhi, Shantanu ; De Vaate, Jan Geralt bij ; Hall, Peter
Author_Institution :
Int. Centre for Radio Astron. Res., Curtin Univ., Perth, WA, Australia
Abstract :
The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will be the most sensitive radio telescope ever built. It is divided into three operating bands. Sparse aperture arrays (SKA-low) are used at the lowest operating band of 70 - 450 MHz. The International Centre for Radio Astronomy (ICRAR) is exploring conical spiral antennas as one candidate antenna design for SKA-low. One of the attractive features of the conical spiral antenna is its frequency-stable impedance. This helps in matching it to external components such as a low-noise amplifier (LNA). A prototype LNA based on GaAs HEMT technology that might be suitable for the conical spiral antenna has been evaluated. Presented in this paper is the current design path for a conical spiral antenna with attached LNA.
Keywords :
UHF antennas; VHF antennas; active antenna arrays; aperture antennas; conical antennas; gallium arsenide; high electron mobility transistors; low noise amplifiers; radiotelescopes; spiral antennas; HEMT technology; International Centre for Radio Astronomy; LNA; SKA; active antenna development; candidate antenna design; conical spiral antenna; frequency-stable impedance; low-noise amplifier; sensitive radio telescope; sparse aperture arrays; square kilometre array; Antenna measurements; Antennas; Arrays; Noise; Prototypes; Spirals; Temperature measurement; SKA; frequency independent antenna; low-noise amplifiers (LNA); radio astronomy;
Conference_Titel :
Microwave Conference Proceedings (APMC), 2011 Asia-Pacific
Conference_Location :
Melbourne, VIC
Print_ISBN :
978-1-4577-2034-5
