Reduction of Computational Resources When Analyzing Scatterers Using CMA
Sections III and IV presented the revealing of the most significant modes when analyzing simple antennas and scatterers using CMA. However, the determination of the number of modes needed to analyze the structures was not considered. At the same time, it was found that calculating pn of all modes and analyzing the influence of each mode in complex structures (made up of many segments) can make the analysis time very large. Therefore, reducing the computational cost when analyzing complex structures using CMA is really necessary.
The algorithm for reducing computational resources when analyzing scatterers using CMA is shown in
Figure 5. The reduction in computational time is based on selecting the most significant modes by comparing the
pnmean values with
Tp×
pnmean_max (where
Tp is a chosen threshold value). In this paper, we use
Tp=0.1 to obtain accurate results while reducing the time required for analysis. Note that choosing a high
Tp may result in inaccurate analysis results, while a low
Tp will increase computational time.
However, considering significant modes using only Tp helps to reduce analysis time. Specifically, to analyze complex structures that require many segments (for example, tens of thousands), it is necessary to store all In and MSn to determine all pn and then compare them with Tp×pnmean_max which will require a lot of memory. Therefore, in this work, we use the thresholds TI and TMS to initially remove modes with small In and MSn. This will help to store In, MSn, and pn which requires less memory if compared with the case of considering all modes. In this work, we use TI=TMS=0.01.
To verify the results of CMA based on our algorithm obtained for scatterers, different structures were considered: plate scatterer S1 from [
11], dihedral CR (DCR) S2 from [
11], S3 from [
12], S4 from [
13], and triagular trihedral CR (TTCR) S5 from [
14]. The backscattering cross section (BSCS) results obtained using CMA were compared with those obtained using measurement and other numerical methods such as: MoM with piecewise-sinusoidal basis function (PWS) [
11], Physical Theory of Diffraction (PTD) [
12], MoM in FEKO, Ray Launching-Geometrical Optics (RL-GO) [
13], shooting and bouncing ray (SBR), multilevel fast multipole method (MLFMM) [
14], and MoM based on WG with pulse basis function (PBF).
The equivalent WG DCR and TTCR structures are illustrated in
Figure 6. DCR structure is formed by two rectangular plates (A and B) whose intersection coincides with the Oz axis and the angle between them is 2γ (for S2, it is 130°, and for S3 and S4, it is 90°). Both plates are characterized by the height (
H) and the length (
L).
The perfect conducting TTCR is made of 3 isosceles right triangles, with the height H and the length of the base leg L. The surfaces of the TTCR lie in the xOz, yOz, xOy planes, and they are orthogonal to each other. The origin of the coordinate system coincides with the intersection point between their surfaces.
In this publication, solid scatterers were first approximated by WG, then these WGs were analyzed using CMA with the approach mentioned in
Figure 5 and compared with the scattering characteristics of the solid structure taken from the published papers [
11,
12,
13,
14]. When modeling the considered scatterers by WG, their plates were divided into cells of equal size and edge length of Δ (
Figure 6) (each WG cell edge was considered to be as one wire represented by one segment with a length Δ). The value of Δ was determined as: λ/6≥Δ≥λ/20, while the wire radius was
a=Δ/2π. To excite the scatterers, incident plane waves had different linear polarizations (θ, ϕ) and directions defined by φ
inc and θ
inc. The scattered waves had directions defined by φ
s and θ
s. The parameters of scatterers, the incident plane wave used to excite them, and the methods used to analyze them according to the papers considering them are listed in
Table 1.
First, the BSCS obtained for S1 using CMA based on our algorithm was compared with that obtained using MoM with PWS and experimentally in [
11] (
Figure 7). It was found that the BSCSs obtained using numerical methods and measurements agree quite well with each other. In particular, the BSCSs using MoM with PBF and CMA almost agree with each other. Moreover, it can be seen from
Figure 7 that CMA and MoM with PBF results agree even more with the measurement results than MoM with PWS in θ=0° plane. Although the BSCSs obtained using MoM with PBF and CMA in the side lobes differ from the measurement results, the differences are not large. In addition, main lobes agree quite well with each other; the deviation at maximum BSCS magnitude is about 0.5 dB, and the maximum deviation in xOy-plane is about 1.7 dB and yOz-plane is about 6 dB.
Next, the BSCS results for S2 in the θ=90° and ϕ=0° planes calculated using CMA were compared with those obtained experimentally and numerically using MoM with PBF and MoM with PWS in [
11] (
Figure 8). Similarly to S1, the CMA results are in good agreement with those obtained by MoM with PBF (almost a complete match) and experimentally (the maximum deviation is less than 1.5 dB in the θ=90° plane and less than 0.25 dB in the ϕ=0° plane).
Figure 8 also shows that the CMA results are closer to the measured ones than those of MoM with PWS. The maximum deviations calculated when comparing CMA (and MoM with PBF) and MoM with PWS results are about 9 dB in the θ=90° plane and 3.5 dB in the ϕ=0° plane.
The main lobe width in ϕ=0° plane is approximately the same as that in θ=90° plane (about 25°). In the θ=90° plane, it is seen that when the incident wave deviates from ϕ=0° the BSCS starts to decrease rapidly and reaches a low value at ϕ=30°. In the θ=90° plane, when the incident wave is at ϕ=30° direction, it is perpendicular to the opposite plane and the energy scattered by this plane is in the same direction as the incident wave. However, the wave reflected by the remaining plane is scattered in other directions, and the energy returns in a direction that differs from that of the incident wave.
Next, the BSCSs for S3 were calculated by CMA and compared with the experimental and numerical results using MoM with PBF and PTD in [
12] (
Figure 9a).
The results show that the CMA results have acceptable agreement with the PTD results in the main lobe (deviation is 1.3 dB with PTD and 0 dB with meassurements), but the deviation between them increases in the side lobes (10 dB with PTD and 9 dB with measurements). As can be seen in
Figure 9a, the BSCS of the DCR scatterer with 2γ=90° reaches a maximum at φ
inc=0°. This value varies slightly over the range of azimuthal angles (–15°; 15°), but decreases rapidly outside this range. This is due to the fact that in this range most of the scattered energy is returned in the direction opposite to the incident wave. In addition, the BSCS value increases suddenly in the ranges (–50°; –40°) and (40°; 50°). This can be explained by the fact that the plane wave is directed orthogonally to one of the DCR plates.
Next, the BSCSs for S4 were considered. Their values obtained using CMA were compared with those obtained experimentally and numerically using MoM with PBF, MoM in FEKO, and RL_GO in FEKO in [
13] (
Figure 9b). The results are in good agreement with each other in the main lobe and are more deviated in the side lobe. Similar to the above cases, the BSCSs obtained using CMA and MoM with PBF are very similar. From
Figure 9, it can be seen that the optical method is more deviated than the measurement results and the remaining methods. When the incident wave has ϕ-polarization, the BSCS also has a shape similar to those when the incident wave has θ-polarization (reach the magnitude maximum at ϕ=0° and have 2 peaks at ϕ=±45°).
Finally, the BSCS results for S5 obtained using CMA were compared with those obtained using MoM_PBF, MLFMM, and SBR in [
14] (
Figure 10). It is seen that the CMA results deviate slightly from those obtained using MoM with PBF (maximum deviation is about 4.2 dB), SBR (maximum deviation is about 4 dB), and MLFMM (maximum deviation is about 4 dB). The maximum BSCS magnitudes match quite well for all methods (15.55 dB for CMA and MoM, 15.51 dB for MLFMM, and 14.9 dB for SBR). In general, the results match well with each other at the main region except that the BSCS using MLFMM deviates more than the other methods. In addition, the magnitude of BSCS using CMA deviates slightly from that using MoM and SBR at about θ≈48°. When the incident wave excites at the θ-plane, the obtained BSCS shape is asymmetric because of the asymmetry of the structure in this plane. The BSCS results for all methods reach the maximum magnitude at ϕ=45°, θ≈55° (about 15.5 dB).
All the above verification results proved the correctness of the proposed algorithm. Meanwhile, we compared the time and memory required to calculate the surface current and the scattered field when using CMA with different threshold factors. The obtained results are shown in
Table 2.
The data in
Table 2 demonstrate that the computational cost required using CMA with our algorithm (
TI=
TMS=0.01,
Tp=0.1) was greatly reduced compared to CMA when using all modes (
TI=
TMS=0,
Tp=0). When
TI=
TMS=0 and
Tp=0.1, the simulation time was greatly reduced compared to CMA when considering all modes; however, the memory was not considerably reduced. This might have happened because when
TI=
TMS=0, the determination of the most significant modes still requires calculating
pn of all modes. Therefore, the memory required to store
In, λ
n,
MSn, and
pn for all modes is still quite high. However, using
TI=
TMS=0.01 helped to slightly reduce the required memory (
Table 2).
It was also found that when analysing the S1 and S2 structures, the time and memory required for their analysis in different planes are almost the same. The small difference may be explained by the fact that the influence of the excitation wave changed in these planes, causing the number of significant modes to change slightly.
When using CMA with all modes to analyze the S4 and S5 structures, the computation time in one angle for S5 (5259 s) is almost the same as that for S4 in one angle (5166 s). This can be explained by the fact that these structures have the same number of segments (14910 for S5 and 14580 for S4), and thus the number of modes is also almost the same.
As for the case of analysing S5 using CMA with TI=TMS=0.01, Tp=0.1, the calculation time at one angle (201 s) is high compared to that of the S4 structure (32 s), although when analyzing these 2 structures we used almost the same number of segments. This can be explained by the fact that the TTCR structure is more complex, so it needs more meaningful modes to simulate (about 400–500 modes). By contrast, to analyze S4, only about 80–90 modes are needed. However, it can be seen that using CMA with our algorithm still helps to considerably reduce the required memory compared to the remaining CMA cases.