Broadband radar cross section reduction by in-plane integration of scattering metasurfaces and magnetic absorbing materials

An in-plane hybrid design is proposed to achieve broadband radar cross section (RCS) reduction based on the integration of a diffusion scattering electromagnetic band-gap (EBG) metasurface and a magnetic absorbing material (MAM) at a thin thickness (d). A scattering field calculation formula is derived for the hybrid design, in which the MAM and EBG metasurface have complementary dominant working bands. Moreover, they are able to achieve strong RCS reduction in broad band by working together. As a result, the as-designed hybrid metasurface show in both simulation and experiment an unprecedented broadband RCS reduction of 6 dB in the frequency range of 5–34 GHz with d of only 2 mm. The design strategy proposed here provides a feasible and extendable approach to broaden the bandwidth of RCS reduction by multiple mechanisms and hybrid materials based on the concept of metasurface.