Frequency-Selective Rasorber Based on High-Q Minkowski Fractal-Shaped Resonator for Realizing a Low Radar Cross-Section Radiating System

In this article, a novel design of compact frequency-selective rasorber exhibiting absorption-transmission-absorption characteristics and having high passband selectivity has been proposed. A square-loop resonator with mounted lossy elements serves as the elemental broadband absorber from 4 to 12 GHz. The transmission frequency at 8.4 GHz is realized by printing a Minkowski fractal-shaped resonator with a high-Q factor on the resistive layer, which provides a transmission pole at the frequency corresponding to the passband of a double-cross-slot-shaped bandpass layer. The functioning of the proposed frequency-selective rasorbers (FSR) is explained by a corresponding equivalent circuit model. The proposed FSR exhibits higher selectivity at the passband, thus making it a suitable candidate for shielding the narrowband radiating system. Measurements performed on the fabricated prototype of a 17 × 17 unit cell array provides experimental validation. Further, a low radar cross-section antenna is realized by integrating a patch antenna with the proposed FSR, which achieves an average out-of-band monostatic radar cross-section (RCS) reduction of 11.92 and 5.04 dB in the lower (4-7.5 GHz) and upper (9.2-10.8 GHz) absorption bands, respectively, while maintaining the other antenna parameters. Furthermore, the bistatic total RCS reduction of 77% and 60% are achieved in the lower and upper frequency bands, respectively.