System aspects of future airborne radar technology

Among the impressive advantages of AESA technology are flexible antenna designs using TRMs (transmit-receive modules), small installation depth of antennas, and low RF (radio frequency) losses in the TRMs. On the basis of these features, new design principles for airborne radar systems can be realised. Thus it is possible to design multi-faceted arrays and to optimally adapt them to the operational requirements and the installation restrictions of the aircraft. Also, an AESA permits the flexible combination of TRMs to form subarrays for adaptive beam patterns on receive. The varied configuration possibilities for multi-faceted arrays and the resulting capabilities of such radar systems with active electronic scanning are described