A Novel Near‐Omnidirectional Absorber for TM‐Polarized Waves Based on Wide‐Beam Radiator

ABSTRACT Despite the relatively mature development of electromagnetic absorbers, achieving omnidirectional absorption characteristics remains a challenging task. In this letter, a novel near‐omnidirectional absorber based on the antenna reciprocity principle is proposed. The design follows a two‐step approach: first, a wide‐beam radiator is developed by combining monopole and dipole elements to broaden the radiation beamwidth; second, the radiator is transformed into an absorber through appropriate lumped‐resistor loading. The proposed structure features a low profile, compact unit‐cell size, and simple fabrication process while maintaining excellent TM‐polarized absorption. When the incident angle varies from to , the absorptivity remains above 90 within 7.6–12.3 and exceeds 80 within 6.6–15.1 . The total thickness is only 0.101 at 7.6 , and the unit‐cell size is 0.142 at the same frequency. A prototype was fabricated and experimentally characterized, with the measured results confirming stable absorption performance for incident angles ranging from to , thereby validating the effectiveness and practicality of the proposed design.