Back مصفوفة طورية Arabic فاز آراشدیران رادار AZB Фазирана антенна решетка Bulgarian Antena de matriu de fase Catalan Phased-Array-Antenne German Antenas en fase Spanish آرایه فازی Persian Antenne réseau à commande de phase French מערך מופע HE Fázisvezérelt antennarács Hungarian
In antenna theory, a phased array consists of many small antennas, positioned in an array, next to each other.
Instead of sending a radio wave with one antenna, a computer system can shift the phase of the original wave by fractions of a wavelength for each individual antenna in the array. The frequency of the signal is not changed, only the phase by precisely delaying the signal for each antenna in the array, resulting in a shift of the wave crest and trough for each antenna.
This allows the radio wave being sent out to be concentrated in a specific direction by creating a constructive interference pattern from the shifted phases of each individual wave. The resulting signal just looks like any other radio wave, being the strongest in the desired direction, where the phase of all individual waves align and constructively interfere.
Phased arrays are mainly used at the high frequency end of the radio spectrum. Smaller wavelengths can be sent with smaller antennas, allowing the total size of the array to be practical.