'Stealth' antenna made of gas

'Stealth' antenna made of gas is impervious to jamming

A new antenna made of plasma (a gas heated to the point that the electrons are ripped free of atoms and molecules) works just like conventional metal antennas, except that it vanishes when you turn it off.

That's important on the battlefield and in other applications where antennas need to be kept out of sight. In addition, unlike metal antennas, the electrical characteristics of a plasma antenna can be rapidly adjusted to counteract signal jamming attempts.

Plasma antennas behave much like solid metal antennas because electrons flow freely in the hot gas, just as they do in metal conductors. But plasmas only exist when the gasses they're made of are very hot. The moment the energy source heating a plasma antenna is shut off, the plasma turns back into a plain old (non conductive) gas.

As far as radio signals and antenna detectors go, the antenna effectively disappears when the plasma cools down.


You can read more on this at the Scientific Blogging website
http://www.scientificblogging.com/news_ac....jamming





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Goes to show you nothing is secret anymore....Any enemy will now know and utilize it also when it`s perfected and available to the highest bidder. Might as well use hollow lexan or plexiglass tubes filled with saltwater and filled/empty to band resonance also....

 

Plus side can be used by wildlife managers?

 

Or on condos and deed restricted areas etc.

 

It is a problem when stories are half explained.

While it is possible to modulate a plasma and have it radiate, the amount of overall energy required to generate the plasma is tremendous compared to the useful RF output.

It is also not a good conductor by any stretch of the imagination so radiation efficiency would be terrible.

Still there is some potential this would work ......right after we get the cold fusion going in the battery packs.

In the meantime someone somewhere is probably making big money from a government grant to learn what everyone already should know.

73 Tom

 

Well I dont think this is something that needs to be hidden from the enemy, it never said it was american made or the technology came from america. They cant jam it so who cares!

 

Does anyone remember when there were experiments going on in during the Vietnam war that had to do with using trees as antennas? Had it been practical it would have been the perfect stealth antenna. Unfortunately the laws of physics sort of got in the way.

73
George
K3UD

 

Also, the photo may, in fact, be a simple neon gas-filled tube. And, the plasma is created not by some mysterious new concept, but by application of very high voltage.

Of course, if anyone has ever listened (or tried to) to HF anywhere near a neon fixture in operation, you'll quickly decide that the impulse noise blankets the front end of the receiver.

Now, the question is: At microwave frequencies, using modes not subject to amplitude noise, can such noise be tolerated? Perhaps.

But, in any case, trying to use such a high resistance path for RF current seems fruitless.

One would think that with monolithic materials and such, antennas already can and are easily made sufficiently stealthy. Being made part of aircraft skins, and perhaps even ground vehicles.

Another strange comment that doesn't make sense is frequency agility. What with frequency independent antennas such as the discone and log periodic, it makes one wonder why the necessity to change the wavelength of some gas-filled device.

 

what a bunch of hooey!

 

What a great april 1st tech article for QST , and it cant be interfered with ? This is a great country as you can write articles like this get funding and not go to the physco ward . Methinks we've been had .

 

If this is a "hot gas" antenna then how is it stealthy? Anyone with a simple infrared sensor should be able to focus on the column of heat coming up. Anyway, I can see real problems with mobility. Unlike a handheld the operator could not get too close to the antenna. (And if it's optically invisible having that nearby could be really dangerous.) Interesting idea, though.

 

Here you go George: Linky-poo

Ralph Hartwell is an amazing guy. Look at his website for more of his projects.

 

Can't jam it! That's a serious load of hooey. It seems from the description, the reason they say it cannot be jammed is the fact it can rapidly be retuned. I don't think that it can be retuned faster than some of today's microprocessor controlled tuners. If it is still emmiting RF it can be jammed. And from the picture of the hot glowing gasses it does not look very stealthy to me.
It sure seems to be a lot more complicated (read expensive) than a plain old piece of wire that is easily hidden.

Now on the other hand, an antenna I have been trying to create uses a laser (non-visible) that points straight up and could be loaded as an antenna. It would make a nice 160 meter vertical that you could turn on and off at will.  Or present a resonant element segment at some distance above the earth. You could effectively create a two meter vertical at great heights that needs no support. Another possibility would be to create a series of standing waves in the laser beam that would act to separate elements and allow phased arrays. I know it is possible and will eventually be built but I may not be around to see it.  
Hey, I just think them up. Some one else with the right knowledge will have to build it.

  KL7FZ

 

Hmmm... a glass antenna in a combat zone. Ya, that should hold up well.

Minton

 

Seems I recall reading this article as an April fools gag a while back... HMMM....