A New Approach to the Link Budget Concept for an OAM Communication Link

Following on from the increasing interest for electromagnetic waves carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM), different configurations of antenna systems able to generate such beams have been proposed. However, in our opinion, a traditional radiation pattern approach does not provide the right picture of an OAM-based communication link. For this reason, we propose a new general concept, the “OAM-link pattern,” which takes into account the peculiar phase structure characterizing these waves. Focusing on OAM transmissions between antenna arrays, we introduce a formula for the link budget evaluation that describes the whole communication link and directly leads to a “classically shaped” main lobe pattern for a proper rephased reception in the case of uniform circular arrays.