Engineering Commons^™

Deployable Tightly Coupled Dipole Arrays For Small Satellites, Maxence Carvalho

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation presents the theory, design, fabrication, and verification of several critical components for a novel class of origami-based and deployable Tightly Coupled Dipole Arrays (TCDAs) suitable for small satellite applications. This work introduces a new approach to enhance the bandwidth of TCDAs by incorporating a semi-resistive Frequency Selective Surface (FSS) network within the substrate. The integration of this FSS network within a dual-polarized TCDA led to an increased impedance bandwidth of 28:1 from 0.20 GHz to 5.6 GHz. Concurrently, losses above 2.5 GHz are reduced to achieve a radiation efficiency of 83% on average. A major component of the …

Origami Antennas For Novel Reconfigurable Communication Systems, Xueli Liu

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Antennas play a crucial role in communication systems since they are the transmitting/receiving elements that transition information from guided transmission to open-space propagation. Antennas are used in many different applications such as aerospace communications, mobile phones, TVs and radios. Since the dimensions of antennas are usually physically proportional to the wavelength at their operating frequencies, it is important to develop large antennas and arrays that can be stowed compactly and easily deployed. Also, it is important to minimize the number of antennas on a platform by developing multifunctional antennas.

The first aim of this research is to develop new deployable, …

Origami Reconfigurable Electromagnetic Systems, Shun Yao

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

With the ever-increasing demand for wireless communications, there is a great need for efficient designs of electromagnetic systems. Reconfigurable electromagnetic systems are very useful because such designs can provide multi-functionality and support different services. The geometrical topology of an electromagnetic element is very important as it determines the element’s RF performance characteristics. Origami geometries have significant advantages for launch-and-carry electromagnetic devices where devices need to fold in order to miniaturize their size during launch and unfold in order to operate after the platform has reached orbit.

This dissertation demonstrates a practical process for designing reconfigurable electromagnetic devices using origami structures. …