Feasibility study on a plasma based reflective surface for SatCom systems

Gaseous Plasma Antennas (GPAs) exploit an ionized gas to transmit and receive electromagnetic waves. GPAs offer several advantages over metal antennas since, while in use, they are electronically reconfigurable in terms of radiation pattern and operation frequency. When not used, the plasma can be turned “off”, and the GPA reverts to a dielectric tube with a very low radar cross-section. This makes GPAs suitable to be stacked into arrays, providing they can reduce co-site interference. Thus, GPAs are very appealing for Satellite Communications (SatCom). The antenna pointing and tracking obtained by steering the beam electronically, rather than using mechanically moving parts, can enable several space missions. A plasma-based reflective surface has been recently proposed in this framework to maximize reconfigurability. Such a device consists of many plasma discharges placed on top of a metallic ground plane, and the reflection of radio signals can be controlled by electronically varying...