Low Frequency Radio Transmission Through a Collisional Plasma: Theory and Simulation

High-speed flight above Mach 5 leads to the formation of a thin plasma layer surrounding the vehicle. Transmission through this plasma layer is currently not possible when the frequency of the source is below the electron plasma frequency. In this paper, we show that introducing finite electron-neutral collisions in the plasma increases transmission. We first discuss the relevant theory. We then present results from a frequency dependent FDTD plasma dielectric model. Good agreement between theory and simulation is demonstrated with both methods demonstrating that transmission increases at larger collision frequencies and lower source frequencies.