Numerical Analysis of a Tunable Magnetized Plasma Loop Antenna

Abstract

In this study, a plasma loop tube is presented as a tunable VHF-UHF band plasma antenna. In plasma medium, wave radiation mechanism is due to ionized gas instead of metal. Meanwhile, the most important advantage of plasma elements is electronic tunability rather than the rigid and fixed features of metals. Here, we employ an external magnetic field as a background to affect the plasma without any shape, gas or source manipulation. Finite difference time domain (FDTD) is performed for plasma antenna analysis. The FDTD formulation should be adapted to fluid modeling of plasma in the anisotropic zone in the presence of an external magnetic field. The bandwidth coverage of 700MHz is obtained by designing correctly. Parametric study in return loss, gain and radiation pattern are studied here and other new points are presented as well.