Millimeter-wave Toroidal Lens-Array Antennas Experimental Measurements

Abstract

High gain steerable antennas are the key element of the modern millimeter-wave communication systems: high gain required for overcoming large pathloss in this band, while steering is required for mobile access and reconfigurable backhauling links. In this paper we propose and evaluate the toroidal lens-array antenna (LAA) design, which provide high gain by focusing the beam in elevation plane, while beamsteering can be done in the azimuthal plane. Three LAA systems of different size demonstrated reliable multi-gigabit link at distances 100-300m. The further gain (and aperture) increase of LAAs limited mainly by the lens size and weight.