Defining the position of the antennas of an interferometer in the presence of electromagnetic coupling

This paper deals with the problem of the coupling due to the electromagnetic interactions between array antennas and the structure of an aircraft. The objective is to propose a methodology to insure good performances of direction finding by limiting as much as possible the effects of coupling. The context is Electronic Support Measures (ESM), and we consider a large interferometer array in order to obtain a high precision goniometry of emitters on the ground. The goal of the methodology is to define the geometry of the interferometer - the position of the antennas - that limits as much as possible the effects of electromagnetic coupling.