An Improved RHCP Archimedean Spiral Antenna for Glacial Environmental Sensor Networks

An improved version of a printed RHCP Archimedean spiral antenna for glacial environmental sensor networks is presented. Two changes have been made to the previous design. Firstly, the microstrip connections between the balun and the antenna arms have been tapered. Secondly, the antenna arms have been rounded at the edges towards the antenna boundary. These measures have improved the antenna performance in the following ways. Firstly, the signal quality has been improved by minimizing reflections and signal distortion. Secondly, the microstrip tapering between the balun and the antenna arms has increased the radiating surface area in the region. Resultantly, significant improvements in the antenna’s reflection coefficient, gain, total efficiency, and axial ratio have been observed

An Antenna Solution for Glacial Environmental Sensor Networks

Antennas used in glacial environmental sensor networks and reported in the last two decades have been reviewed. A link budget framework for designing such antenna systems is presented and used to design an antenna system for deployment at the Thwaites glacier, Antarctica. Design details of two left hand circularly polarized cross dipole antennas, one for englacial sensor probes and the other for supraglacial surface receivers are presented. The probe antenna is a 3D bent cross dipole that fits within a borehole of 8 cm diameter while providing a 1 dBic gain at 433 MHz in ice. The surface receiver antenna is a planar printed antenna providing a gain of 6.1 dBic with a quarter wave reflector. Both antennas provide 3 dB beamwidths of at least 50° in the xz and yz vertical planes catering for transmitter-receiver antenna misalignments caused by extended deployments. The antennas displayed good circular polarization and polarization purity traits. The 3 dB axial ratio bandwidths of both the antennas remained 54.9 %. The total efficiencies of the bent cross dipole and the surface receiver antennas were noted as 69.7 % and 86.9 % respectively. Lastly, the 433 MHz band has been validated for achieving englacial communication ranges of up to 2300 metres

A Low Profile Wideband RHCP Printed Archimedean Spiral Antenna for Glacial Telemetry Applications

Suitability of a RHCP printed Archimedean spiral antenna for glacier telemetry applications in the 433 MHz band has been assessed for the first time. The developed antenna provides a gain of 7.4 dBic at 433 MHz and a -10 dB fractional bandwidth of 47% in snow. The antenna beamwidths in the vertical planes cater for misalignments between the transmitter and receiver antennas due to basal sliding. The measured axial ratio remained below 1.4 dB between 330–580 MHz. Lastly, evidence has been provided towards suitability of the 433 MHz band for achieving communication ranges up to 2300 metres in ice

Innate Pathways of Immune Activation in Transplantation

Studies of the immune mechanisms of allograft rejection have predominantly focused on the adaptive immune system that includes T cells and B cells. Recent investigations into the innate immune system, which recognizes foreign antigens through more evolutionarily primitive pathways, have demonstrated a critical role of the innate immune system in the regulation of the adaptive immune system. Innate immunity has been extensively studied in its role as the host's first-line defense against microbial pathogens; however, it is becoming increasingly recognized for its ability to also recognize host-derived molecules that result from tissue damage. The capacity of endogenous damage signals acting through the innate immune system to lower immune thresholds and promote immune recognition and rejection of transplant grafts is only beginning to be appreciated. An improved understanding of these pathways may reveal novel therapeutic targets to decrease graft alloreactivity and increase graft longevity

Phase-sensitive FMCW radar system for high-precision Antarctic ice shelf profile monitoring

Ice shelves fringe much of the Antarctic continent, and, despite being up to 2 km thick, are vulnerable to climate change. Owing to their role in helping to control the ice sheet contribution to sea level change there is great interest in measuring the rate at which they are melting into the ocean. This study describes the development and deployment of an ice-penetrating phase-sensitive FMCW radar, sufficiently robust and with sufficiently low-power consumption to be run through the Antarctic winter as a standalone instrument, yet with the stability and mm-precision needed to detect the very slow changes in ice shelf thickness in this exceptionally demanding environment. A number of elegant processing techniques are described to achieve reliable, high-precision performance and results presented on field data obtained from the Larsen-C ice shelf, Antarctica

Observations of tidal melt and vertical strain at the Filchner‐Ronne Ice Shelf, Antarctica

The Filchner‐Ronne Ice Shelf experiences strong tidal forcing known to displace portions of the ice shelf by several meters over a tidal cycle. These large periodic displacements may cause significant variation of the ice shelf vertical strain. Further, tidal currents in the ice shelf cavity may be responsible for basal melt variations. We deployed autonomous phase‐sensitive radio‐echo sounders at 17 locations across the ice shelf and measured basal motion and internal vertical ice motion at sufficiently short intervals to allow the resolution of all significant tidal constituents. Basal melt estimates with this surface‐based technique rely on accurate estimation of vertical strain changes in the ice shelf. We present a method that can separate the vertical strain changes from the total thickness changes at tidal time scales, yielding a tidal basal melt estimate. The method was used to identify vertical strain and basal melt variations at the predominant semi‐diurnal M2 tidal constituent. At most sites the tidal vertical strain was depth‐independent. Tidal deformation at four sites was controlled by local effects causing elastic bending. Significant tidal melt was observed to occur at six locations and upper bounds on the tidal melt amplitude were derived for the remaining sites. Finally, we show that observations of basal melt spectra, specifically at tidal frequencies and their multiples, can provide constraints on the hydrographic conditions near the ice base, such as the non‐tidal background ocean flow

Polarimetric airborne scientific instrument, mark 2, an ice‐sounding airborne synthetic aperture radar for subglacial 3D imagery

Polarimetric Airborne Scientific INstrument, mark 2 (PASIN2) is a 150 MHz coherent pulsed radar with the purpose of deep ice sounding for bedrock, subglacial channels and ice‐water interface detection in Antarctica. It is designed and operated by the British Antarctic Survey from 2014. With multiple antennas, oriented along and across‐track, for transmission and reception, it enables polarimetric 3D estimation of the ice base with a single pass, reducing the gridding density of the survey paths. The off‐line data processing stream consists of channel calibration; 2D synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging based on back‐projection, for along‐track and range dimensions; and finally, a direction of arrival estimation (DoA) of the remaining across‐track angle, by modifying the non‐linear MUSIC algorithm. Calibration flights, during the Antarctic Summer campaigns in 16/17 and 19/20 seasons, assessed and validated the instrument and processing performances. Imaging flights over ice streams and ice shelves close to grounding lines demonstrate the 3D sensing capabilities. By resolving directional ambiguities and accounting for reflector across‐track location, the true ice thickness and bed elevation are obtained, thereby removing the error of the usual assumption of vertical DoA, that greatly influence the output of flow models of ice dynamics

Design of a high gain & ultra wideband microstrip array antenna for avalanche radar

This paper presents the design and construction of a microstrip array antenna operating at 5.3 GHz, to be used as an avalanche sensor in avalanche measurement. The advantage of the antenna is it can achieve a high gain of 15.6 dB with bandwidth of 90%. This was achieved by separating the feed network from the main patches; and increasing the antenna height by installing the feed layer at the back of the patch layer, sharing the same ground plane. In order to ensure the power is transferred smoothly from the main input port, the feed is design in novel spider like tapered feed network while ensuring the overall antenna function is not compromised. © 2011 IEEE

Polarimetric airborne scientific instrument, mark 2, an ice‐sounding airborne synthetic aperture radar for subglacial 3D imagery

Polarimetric Airborne Scientific INstrument, mark 2 (PASIN2) is a 150 MHz coherent pulsed radar with the purpose of deep ice sounding for bedrock, subglacial channels and ice-water interface detection in Antarctica. It is designed and operated by the British Antarctic Survey from 2014. With multiple antennas, oriented along and across-track, for transmission and reception, it enables polarimetric 3D estimation of the ice base with a single pass, reducing the gridding density of the survey paths. The off-line data processing stream consists of channel calibration; 2D synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging based on back-projection, for along-track and range dimensions; and finally, a direction of arrival estimation (DoA) of the remaining across-track angle, by modifying the non-linear MUSIC algorithm. Calibration flights, during the Antarctic Summer campaigns in 16/17 and 19/20 seasons, assessed and validated the instrument and processing performances. Imaging flights over ice streams and ice shelves close to grounding lines demonstrate the 3D sensing capabilities. By resolving directional ambiguities and accounting for reflector across-track location, the true ice thickness and bed elevation are obtained, thereby removing the error of the usual assumption of vertical DoA, that greatly influence the output of flow models of ice dynamics

Reference-free amplitude-based WiFi passive sensing

The parasitic exploitation of WiFi signals for passive sensing purposes is a topic that is attracting considerable interest in the scientific community. In an attempt at meeting the requirements for sensor compactness, easy deployment, and low cost, we resort to a non-coherent signal processing scheme that does not rely on the availability of a reference signal and relaxes the constraints on the sensor hardware implementation. Specifically, with the proposed strategy, the presence of a moving target echo is determined by detecting the amplitude modulation that it produces on the direct signal transmitted from the WiFi access point. We investigate the target discrimination capability of the resulting sensor against the competing interference background and we theoretically characterize the impact of undesired amplitude fluctuations in the received signal that are determined by causes other than the superposition of the target echo, thereby including the waveform properties. Hence, we propose different solutions to address the limitations identified, characterized by different complexities, and we investigate their advantages and drawbacks. The conceived signal processing schemes are thoroughly validated on both simulated and experimental data, collected in different operational scenarios