Reduction of the time and simulation calculations of detecting buried targets by using the airborne GPR antenna footprint

In this paper, the calculation of the dimensions of the area illuminated by the antenna (antenna footprint) of an Airborne Ground Penetrating Radar (airborne GPR) has been investigated on the ground's surface and subsurface. In the topic of detecting buried targets by airborne GPR radars, knowing the area illuminated by the radar antenna is very important. By having the dimensions of the illuminated area, we can cell the search area according to it and excite these cells with appropriate power and at a certain time. The advantages of celling according to the antenna footprint are managing the transmitted power and reducing the search time. In this paper, two methods are provided to simulate the detection of buried targets in CST software. In the first method, a horn antenna is used as a radiation element in the structure itself, but in the second method, the antenna is simulated separately and its parameters are used to calculate the antenna footprint. In the first method, the meshing is very large due to the distance between the antenna and the ground's surface, which increases the simulation time, but in the second method, due to the removal of this distance and the use of the antenna footprint as a radiation element, the meshing And the simulation time is greatly reduced.