LAUSR

Abstract The bistatic radar cross section (RCS) of airfoil covered with cold homogeneous plasma is studied using 2-D auxiliary differential equation finite-difference time-domain (ADE-FDTD) method. The bistatic RCS of conductive cylinder, conductive cylinder covered with plasma and conductive airfoil are calculated and the results are compared with those of available literature to validate the accuracy of the algorithm. The influence of different parameters such as incident frequency, plasma frequency, collision frequency and plasma thickness on the airfoil's bistatic RCS are researched. The calculations demonstrate that the influence mechanisms of plasma frequency and collision frequency are more complicated, so they are chosen as variables to optimize the bistatic RCS of airfoil. RCS at every bistatic angle has various levels of attenuation under different choices of plasma frequency and collision frequency. The backscattering stealth effect is prominent with a reduction of 30 dB. At last, the radar scattering characteristics of bending aerofoil is analyzed, which indicates that plasma coat can further reduce the airfoil's RCS in certain angles.