An Experimental Characterization of Atmospheric Turbulence Effects on Millimeter-Wave Propagation in a Controlled Environment

This paper introduces a novel method for experimentally characterizing atmospheric turbulence effects on millimeter-wave propagation in a controlled laboratory environment. A large fan array wind tunnel with 36x36 individually programmable dual-fan units is used to create turbulent flows over a controlled temperature gradient. A W-band (95.4GHz) radar is used to propagate electromagnetic energy through this turbulent flow, while meteorological parameters such as temperature, humidity, and wind speed are measured by co-located sensors. Phase noise self-cancellation and vibration isolation techniques are used to observe scintillation down to millimeter length scales. The effect of temperature gradients and different mean wind speeds are shown to increase and shift the measured power spectrum of the radar signal within the inertial subrange and dissipation regions of turbulence. Results from this experimental setup are shown to be consistent and repeatable across multiple days. This setup can be used to (i) investigate novel techniques for remote sensing of atmospheric turbulence, (ii) develop statistical channel models for millimeter-wave communication systems, and (iii) expand on existing scintillation theory.