As satellite communications requirements increase and more functions are combined in the same frequency band in accordance with the ICNI concept, special requirements are being imposed on the aircraft antenna system.
Depending on data rates to be transmitted via a satellite link, various bandwidths are required for the earth terminals. For high data rates, large relative bandwidths are necessary; and available frequency allocations generally indicate operation at X-band, with Ku-band as a possible additional choice.
Mobile users require full hemispherical coverage of the antenna system. Aircraft users have the additional constraint that the antenna aperture has to be flush with the skin of the aircraft and to conform to the structure.
In this paper, earth terminals utilizing an integrated military satellite communication (ICNI) system are tabulated, and typical parameters are summarized. A number of potential aircraft antenna configurations are analyzed, and a selection process leading to a minimum-cost, minimumweight, aircraft-antenna system for X-band operation is discussed. The chosen antenna system, a phased array using a combination of digital phase steering and traveling wave phase velocity steering, is described in detail. A comparison is presented between this antenna and several other systems
