Enhanced Gain Extrapolation Technique: A Third-Order Scattering Approach for High-Accuracy Antenna Gain With Sparse Sampling, at Fresnel Distances

In this paper we describe an enhanced three-antenna gain extrapolation technique that allows one to determine antenna gain with significantly fewer data points and at closer distances than with the well-established traditional three-antenna gain extrapolation technique that has been in use for over five decades. As opposed to the traditional gain extrapolation technique, where high-order scattering is purposely ignored so as to isolate only the direct antenna-to-antenna coupling, we show that by incorporating third-order scattering the enhanced gain extrapolation technique can be obtained. The theoretical foundation using third-order scattering is developed and experimental results are presented comparing the enhanced technique and traditional technique for two sets of internationally recognized NIST reference standard gain horn antennas at X-band and Ku-band. We show that with the enhanced technique, gain values for these antennas are readily obtained to within stated uncertainties of ±0.07 dB using as few as 10 data points per antenna pair, as opposed to ≈ 4000 -to- 8000 data points per antenna pair that is needed with the traditional technique. Furthermore, with the described enhanced technique, antenna-to-antenna distances can be reduced by a factor of three, and up to a factor of six in some cases, compared to the traditional technique - a significant reduction in the overall size requirement of facilities used to perform gain extrapolation measurements.