Hours:
22 hours (5 credits)

Room:

Aula Riunioni del Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell’Informazione, Via G. Caruso 16, Pisa - Ground Floor

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Short Abstract:

The course aims to give an overview of the measurement techniques and instrumentation that are specific for the characterization of devices and antennas at RF and microwave frequency bands. After an introduction on the main characteristic parameters of typical devices and antennas used in high-frequency wireless systems, basic RF instrumentation will be presented together with related measurement procedures. Experimental sessions will be included to let the students to practice their measurement skills.
Antenna measurement techniques refers to the testing of antennas to ensure that the antenna meets specifications or simply to characterize it. Typical parameters of antennas are gain, bandwidth, radiation pattern, beamwidth, polarization, and impedance. The antenna pattern is the relative power density of the wave transmitted by the antenna in a given direction. A multitude of antenna pattern measurement techniques have been developed. The first technique developed was the far-field range, where the antenna under test (AUT) is placed in the far-field of a range antenna.
Due to the size required to create a far-field range for large antennas, near-field techniques were developed, which allow the measurement of the field on a surface close to the antenna (typically 3 to 10 times its wavelength). This measurement is then predicted to be the same at infinity. A third common method is the compact range, which uses a reflector to create a field near the AUT that looks approximately like a plane-wave.

Course Contents in brief:

1. Introduction to Scattering Parameters (S) and microwave devices.
2. Microwave/millimetric measurements. VNA and Instrumentation
3. Measurements of microwave devices parameters:
   • Scattering Parameters (S) of single-port passive devices
   • Scattering Parameters (S) of multi-port passive devices
4. Introduction to antenna measurements. What to measure? General setup and elements
5. Measurement of far field radiation patterns
   • Distance requirements for far field antenna measurements
   • Radiation pattern and directivity. Gain
   • Polarization, Co-polar and cross-polar patterns
6. Antenna measurement ranges classification:
   • Indoor ranges. Absorbing material
   • Far field ranges. Compact ranges. Near Field ranges
   • Positioners, probes, rotatory joints. RCS ranges
7. Near field measurements
   • Spherical, Cylindrical, Planar.
   • NF-to-FF Transformation and Diagnosis
8. Experimental practice with spherical range scale-model

 Schedule:

1. Day1 – time 25 sept. 2023 9:00-13:00 (4 hours)
2. Day2 – time 26 sept. 2023 9:00-13:00 (4 hours)
3. Day3 – time 27 sept. 2023 9:00-13:00 (4 hours)
4. Day4 – time 28 sept. 2023 9:00-13:00, 15:00-17:00 (6 hours)
5. Day5 – time 29 sept. 2023 9:00-13:00 (4 hours)