Concealment Materials and Techniques for mm-Wave Advanced Antenna Systems

Sammanfattning: With the advent of the 5G technology standard for communication, it is esti-mated that around 50 billion devices around the world will be interconnectedunder this standard [1]. This has prompted the need to investigate new ma-terials, technologies and methods to conceal antennas for preserving the aes-thetic value of urban centers, and preventing these antenna systems from beingidentified or damaged. The aim of this thesis work was to identify possiblematerials and investigate methods for concealing Ericsson’s 5G mm-Wave Ad-vanced Antenna System(AAS) Radio Base Stations. A study of economicallyviable, commercially available materials for concealment, and methods to deter-mine their dielectric properties was done. A practical investigation of the effectsome available concealment materials on the RF performance of the mm-Wavebase station beams, was also performed. The results from the investigationsand measurements performed led to some useful conclusions and understand-ing about the various concealment material solutions. Overall, the investigatedconcealment materials were found to have two prominent effects:1. Reduction in EIRP (Equivalent Isotropic Radiated Power) of the basestation beams (attenuation).2. Distortion in the shape of the base station beams.The boresight beams for all the investigated cases were found to be attenu-ated(effect 1) by the concealments, but the steered beams were found to beboth attenuated in distorted(effect 2) by the concealments. In particular, con-cealments with a thin dielectric material mesh structure were found to have theleast effect on the base station beams. All other thicker(> λ0/2), compositeconcealments and even those with pure foam structures, were found to have anoticeable effect on the base station beams. In conclusion, thin dielectric mesh,films and paints could hence be of interest as concealment solutions for furtherinvestigations moving forward.