Session 1.6d: Update - Advances in Smart Antenna Systems through Additive and Hybrid Manufacturing Techniques
Tracks
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| Tuesday, November 18, 2025 |
| 1:30 PM - 2:30 PM |
| Nicholls Theatre |
Details
The rapid evolution of additive and hybrid manufacturing techniques is reshaping the development of smart antenna systems for defence applications. Beyond conventional polymer-based 3D printing, our recent work adopts a hybrid manufacturing approach that leverages the strengths of waterjet cutting, CNC machining, and dielectric 3D printing to fabricate high-performance antenna components tailored for defence and space environments. This presentation highlights our group’s recent development of metasurface-based smart antennas built and assembled using these advanced manufacturing methods.
We particularly showcase our progress in fabricating low-loss, non-metallic metasurfaces using custom dielectric materials through advanced 3D printing. These offer lightweight, compact solutions ideally suited to platforms where metal-based designs may be unsuitable. Our work on Radix-based 3D printed antennas demonstrates the emerging potential to engineer bespoke RF substrates for wideband and conformal applications.
In addition, this presentation provides an overview of state-of-the-art manufacturing methods currently adopted in the antennas and RF community, with a focus on their implications for scalability, integration, and performance.
We will also introduce the advanced manufacturing capabilities available at UTS and its partner organisations, including multi-material 3D printers, additive manufacturing for PCB and RF electronics, ultrasonic additive manufacturing, and precision waterjet cutting. These resources enable rapid prototyping, iterative development, and system-level integration of next-generation antenna and RF front-end technologies for defence and aerospace applications.
Speaker
Associate Professor Dush Thalakotuna
Associate Professor
University of Technology Sydney
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Biography
Dush Thalakotuna is an Associate Professor in School of Electrical and Data Engineering, University of Technology Sydney, Australia. From 2013-2019, he worked in multiple roles related to radio frequency and systems engineering, electromagnetic interference tracking, secure communication , Interference mitigation, satcom solutions. He is an inventor of three antenna patent applications and authored over 50 refereed journal and conference publications. His current research interests include Defence and Space communication systems, smart antenna systems.
A/Prof. Dush was the recipient of several prestigious awards including Academic of the Year award in 2024 Australian Defence Industry Awards, 2023 Early Career Research Industry Fellowship from Australian Research Council and 2023 Eureka Prize for Outstanding Science in Safeguarding Australia. His team also won the “Academic Research Team of the Year” award for their innovative satellite ground terminal in 2025 Australian Space Awards. He was also a finalist in 2024 Australian Space Awards in both the “Academic of the Year” and “Scientist of the Year” categories. In his relatively short academic career since 2019 he secured over $12 million of industry funding in both defence and space area.
Dush is currently a co-director in the NSW Space Research Network.
