Transmitter/Receiver Pulse-Driven Antenna Array with Near- Field Beam-Forming for UWB Subsurface Imaging Radar

The paper is devoted to design of impulse or equivalent ultra-wide band array antenna for subsurface radar system. Receiving elements of this antenna are arranged in array with small physical aperture and polarimetric features. Two transmitting element support two polarization states for radiating signals. The radar antenna provides down-looking scanning in subsurface medium for small areas covered by array aperture and big areas due to synthetic aperture processing when array moves in 2-D plane along scanning lines. Operation in proximity to a rough dielectric interface affects significantly on radar operation. This and other factors are involved in array antenna design to get enough 3-D spatial scanning with the maximum resolution and range for the available bandwidth. Results of such array analysis, numerical simulation and experiments are presented and discussed.