Waveguide characterization of flexible absorbing material

Among the materials with adequate performance to be used as radar absorbing material (RAM), the conducting polymers have been under intensive study due to their excellent potential for application in electromagnetic interference and microwave absorption areas, replacing conventional absorbing materials. The aim of this work is to present electromagnetic characterization of the flexible radar absorbing material at microwave frequency range obtained from impregnation of polyacrylonitrile nonwoven substrates with the conducting polymer named polyaniline (PAni). By using waveguide technique at frequency range of X-band (8 to 12 GHz) processed absorbing materials were investigated by reflectivity measurements correlating these results and the morphology revealed with scanning electronic microscopy observations. The obtained microwave absorbers showed very efficient to attenuate the incident radiation (approximately 28 dB) along with the fact that it presented low density showing an excellent technological potential for several applications.