George A. Hufford

Abstract: Molecular absorption lines in the millimeter-wave band make the atmosphere dispersive, thus causing the distortion of transmitted signal shapes. To better understand how severe this distortion is and what form it takes, it seems useful to examine the abstract problem of a single, isolated absorption line. The approximate response to such a line may be easily computed and is well described by only a few parameters. We have evaluated these parameters and rather completely characterized the distortion for eight of the more prominent lines below 600 GHz.

Keywords: impulse response; atmosphere; millimeter-wave propagation; frequency response; absorption line; frequency distortion; radio signal distortion

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