A Study on the Physical Characteristics and Development of Plasma Reflectors

In this paper, the physical characteristics of a plasma reflector are investigated. It is observedthat the frequency and angle of the incident electromagnetic waves and also the physicalparameters of the plasma affect the characteristics of the plasma reflector. The analyticalanalysis show that a plasma reflector behaves like a high-pass filter whose cut-off frequency is afunction of the plasma frequency and the angle of the incident electromagnetic wave. Theamount of loss in this filter can be controlled by the plasma pressure and also the thickness ofthe reflector. It is possible to turn this filter on and off by energizing/de-energizing the plasma.In the case of the de-energized filter, the electromagnetic waves pass through it with a partialloss. In this research commercial off-the-shelf dielectric tubes which are cheap and available areused to implement the concept, and various feasible arrangements, for the implemetation of thereflectors with cylindrical dielectric tubes (equivalent to commercial plasma containers) areinvestigated. The simulation results show that using two tublar layers perpendicular to eachother, is the most efficient structure for the plasma reflector.