MULTI-BEAM REFLECTOR ANTENNA FOR SATELLITE APPLICATIONS

Disclosed herein is a feed array (3,44,45,54,55,113,202) for reflector antennas (4,5,100,200). In particular, said feed array (3,44,45,54,55,113,202) is designed to be installed in a reflector antenna (4,5,100,200) provided with a single or dual reflector optics and includes: a radiating array (30) arranged in a focal region of the single/dual reflector optics and operable to transmit and receive radiofrequency signals; digital beam forming means (32,33); reception conversion means (34) connected between the radiating array (30) and the digital beam forming means (32) and designed to apply a frequency down-conversion and an analog-to-digital conversion to incoming radiofrequency signals received by the radiating array (30) thereby obtaining incoming digital signals, and provide the digital beam forming means (32) with the incoming digital signals; and transmission conversion means (35) connected between the radiating array (30) and the digital beam forming means (33) and designed to apply a digital-to-analog conversion and a frequency up-conversion to outgoing digital signals generated by the digital beam forming means (33) thereby obtaining outgoing radiofrequency signals, and provide the radiating array (30) with the outgoing radiofrequency signals to be transmitted by said radiating array (30). The digital beam forming means (32,33) are configured to: process the incoming digital signals by using a reception matrix defined based on a first matrix for beam pointing in reception and a second matrix for compensating for errors in reception due to the single/dual reflector optics; and generate the outgoing digital signals by using a transmission matrix defined based on a third matrix for beam pointing in transmission and a fourth matrix related to errors in transmission due to the single/dual reflector optics. Said second and the fourth matrices are computed based on electric field values measured by the radiating array (30) in the focal region.