Abstract:

The physical optics (PO) method and its improved methods are applied to analyze the radar cross section (RCS) of electrically large objects. To improve the PO method, an equivalent current method (ECM) is presented to obtain the contribution of wedge diffraction. Due to the multi-reflection of electromagnetic wave in cavities, the PO method can not predict the RCS of cavities correctly. To solve this problem, the iterative physical optics (IPO) method and shooting and bouncing rays (SBR) method are applied in the cavity scattering problems, and their merits and demerits are compared to analyze cavity problems. Finally, the graphics processing unit (graphics processing unit, GPU) technology is applied for the ray tracing procedure of SBR. As a result, SBR is significantly accelerated by the GPU technology. Numerical results demonstrate the accuracy and efficiency of the above methods.