The effect of random phase errors on losses and self-noise of phased-array antennas

Theoretical and experimental results are presented concerning the effect of random phase errors on the losses and associated self-noise of passive scanning phased-array antennas with allowance for radiator interaction. It is shown that phase errors do not have an effect on losses in the absence of mutual coupling, but that they lead to an increase in losses in the presence of interaction (even in the Gamma = 0 regime of radiator matching). In addition, these errors smooth the dependence of losses upon the reflection-coefficient modulus (Gamma). The general conclusion is that if different phased-array antennas have different types of radiators their total losses (and the noise level) can be of significantly different types even if other features, such as patterns, section losses, and phase errors, are identical.