Single Printed Flat Reflectors

Abstract

As shown in the preceding chapters, a high efficiency Fresnel zoneplate reflector can be realised by stacking a few layers of dielectric together with metallic zonal patterns in between or by employing a stepped structure. Although these techniques are simple and insensitive to manufacturing tolerances, they can be relatively labour intensive and therefore costly. A much more economical and academically more interesting way of producing high efficiency Fresnel zone reflectors is to employ a single array of inhomogeneous phase correcting elements printed on a grounded dielectric substrate, thus resulting in the single printed flat reflector [17, 41]. In such a configuration, the phase correction is accomplished by an appropriate design of the array elements together with the substrate.