Steering of beam using cylindrical arrangements in a metallic parallel plates structure operating over Ku-band

A novel flat beam steering prototype based on the specific arrangement of a cylindrical unit cell is designed, manufactured and tested. The wideband and broad scanning capability is demonstrated at the Ku-band. We have considered two configurations, first with circular rings (CR) of the defined permittivity values for respective radial distance from the center of the aperture, second with cylindrical rods that shall be placed on a respective CR, which mimics the defined permittivity. The structure is generated from Vero CMYK full color wax, which utilizes the Multijet 3D printing method. The proposed prototype is designed in the operating frequency of 12 GHz (λ = 25 mm) and separation distance between the two parallel plates are maintained at 12.5 mm (0.5λ) for the TE₁₀ mode of operation. The diameter of the two parallel plates and the proposed structure is of 100 mm (4λ) where the radius of cylinders varies from 0.5 to 3.5 mm and corresponding relative permittivity varies from 0.6687 to 2.4395. The overall height of the structure is 12.5 mm and is placed between two parallel plates. The minimum separation distance is maintained between the proposed structure and the feed WR-75 waveguide. Irises effect is performed to obtain impedance matching in the operating frequency bands. Beam steering of the radiated waves is observed for relative rotation angles of 0^◦, 30^◦, 45^◦, 75^◦ and 90^◦ of the WR-75 waveguide along the edge of parallel plates. The overall proposed system weighs 179 g, which signifies the light weight characteristics. Moreover, the proposed structure shows low return loss over 10 GHz to 15 GHz operating frequency band.