Optimized diagnosis of reflectors misalignements in radioastronomical applications

The paper presents an innovative method for the diagnosis of reflector antennas for radio astronomical applications in terms of feed misalignment. The method optimizes the number and the location of the far field sampling points exploited to retrieve the antenna status in order to reduce the time required for the measurement. The goal is achieved by introducing a relevant linear operator connecting the unknowns describing the status of the antenna and its far field pattern thanks to a proper representation of the unknowns, and by optimizing its singular values behavior. A numerical result is provided in the simple case of a phase aperture affected by tilt only, even if the approach is suited for higher order aberrations too. It show that the approach is capable to significantly reduce the number of required samples compared to a standard grid defined according to the Nyquist criterion without affecting the performance of the diagnosis.