2706 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 57, NO.
9, SEPTEMBER 2009
Recursive Two-Way Parabolic Equation Approach for
Modeling Terrain Effects in Tropospheric Propagation
Ozlem Ozgun
Abstract—The Fourier split-step method is a one-way
marching-type algorithm to efficiently solve the parabolic equa-
tion for modeling electromagnetic propagation in troposphere.
The main drawback of this method is that it characterizes only
forward-propagating waves, and neglects backward-propagating
waves, which become important especially in the presence of
irregular surfaces. Although ground reflecting boundaries are
inherently incorporated into the split-step algorithm, irregular
surfaces (such as sharp edges) introduce a formidable challenge.
In this paper, a recursive two-way split-step algorithm is presented
to model both forward and backward propagation in the presence
of multiple knife-edges. The algorithm starts marching in the
forward direction until the wave reaches a knife-edge. The wave
arriving at the knife-edge is partially-reflected by imposing the
boundary conditions at the edge, and is propagated in the back-
ward direction by reversing the paraxial direction in the parabolic
equation. In other words, the wave is split into two components,
and the components travel in their corresponding directions. The
reflected wave is added to the forward-wave in each range step to
obtain the total wave. The wave-splitting is performed each time
a wave is incident on one of the knife-edges. This procedure is
repeated until convergence is achieved inside the entire domain.
Index Terms—Electromagnetic propagation in troposphere,
Fourier split-step method, parabolic wave equation, terrain fac-
tors.
I. INTRODUCTION
T HE troposphere affects the radio wave propagation over a
vast frequency range, from VHF to optical frequencies, in
various ways. It bends, reflects and scatters the electromagnetic
waves, and thus, radio waves can propagate over the horizon
and enhance the range of communication. However, irregular
terrain and anomalous atmospheric conditions have strong in-
fluence on the tropospheric propagation, because these effects
may disrupt the communication links due to the interference
that is not normally there. In the anomalous atmospheric condi-
tions, where steep refractive index gradients in the atmosphere
occur, the radio waves may be trapped in a duct and guided over
distances far greater than the normal range. In addition, the ir-
regular terrain surfaces reflect and diffract the electromagnetic
waves in a complicated way. Hence, it is essential to properly
predict the combined effects of terrain and ducting to success-
fully model the propagation in troposphere.
Manuscript received December 27, 2008; revised March 14, 2009. First pub-
lished July 21, 2009; current version published September 02, 2009.
The author is with the Middle East Technical University, Northern Cyprus
Campus, Department of Electrical Engineering, Guzelyurt, Mersin 10, Turkey
(e-mail: ozozgun@metu.edu.tr).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TAP.2009.2027166
0018-926X/$26.00 © 2009 IEEE
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The efficient modeling of tropospheric propagation in such
environments has long been a challenging problem due to the in-
homogeneties in the medium, as well as surfaces and obstacles
that re-direct the propagating energy. Although some asymp-
totic techniques (geometric optics and geometrical theory of
diffraction for terrain problems) have been used in propagation
modeling, these methods suffer from the presence of the verti-
cally-varying refractivity profile in the atmosphere. The para-
bolic wave equation, which was first introduced by Leontovich
and Fock [1], is a forward-scatter, narrow-angle (or paraxial)
approximation to the Helmholtz wave equation. It has achieved
the theoretical framework for modeling electromagnetic propa-
gation in the troposphere, and has provided practical solutions
for most applications. The development of efficient numerical
solutions of the parabolic wave equation has offered a major
breakthrough for modeling long-range tropospheric propaga-
tion problems in arbitrarily-varying (viz., range- and/or altitude-
dependent) refractivity environments. The parabolic equation
method is an initial-value problem that requires an initial field
at a reference range, and marches out in range by computing the
field along the vertical direction in each range step. One of the
most widely-used methods for numerical solution of the para-
bolic equation is the Fourier split-step (FSS) algorithm, intro-
duced by Hardin and Tappert [2]. The robustness of the FSS al-
gorithm allows the use of larger range steps, and thus, provides a
rigorous and fast solution to most long-range propagation prob-
lems. The FSS technique has been studied by many researchers
to model the propagation over sea or flat terrain, and has been
well documented in the literature [3]–[9]. Moreover, there are
a number of well-known software tools developed for the de-
termination of radar coverage for real-world propagation condi-
tions by using the parabolic equation method, such as AREPS1
(Advanced Refractive Effects Prediction System) and TEMPER
(Tropospheric Electromagnetic Parabolic Equation Routine).
Although the parabolic equation method was initially applied
to propagation over the flat terrain or sea surface, it has also
been utilized for modeling propagation over irregular terrain
[10]–[13]. The majority of the marching algorithms, which are
devised for the solution of the parabolic equation, characterizes
only forward-propagating waves, and neglects backward-prop-
agating waves. Although these algorithms may incorporate the
terrain diffraction into the parabolic equation method, they omit
the backward reflected waves, and offer one-way marching al-
gorithms even in the presence of obstacles. Typically, the for-
ward-propagating wave carries most of the energy. However,
the reflected waves may produce strong backward-propagating
waves in the presence of obstacles, especially under anomalous
1http://areps.spawar.navy.mil/
 OZGUN: RECURSIVE TWO-WAY PARABOLIC EQUATION APPROACH FOR MODELING TERRAIN EFFECTS
atmospheric conditions. Hence, it is crucial to accurately esti-
mate the multipath effects in order to successfully model the
propagation over terrain.
In this paper, a two-way parabolic equation approach is pro-
posed in conjunction with the recursive implementation of the
Fourier split-step algorithm to account for both forward- and
backward-propagating waves in an environment involving mul-
tiple-knife edges and arbitrary atmospheric conditions. This al-
gorithm starts at or near an antenna and marches out in range in
the forward direction. If the wave meets a knife-edge (or ob-
stacle in general), it is partially-reflected and is marched out
in the backward direction by reversing the paraxial direction in
the parabolic equation formulation. The initial field for the re-
flected wave is determined by imposing the boundary conditions
along the edge. At the range step, where the wave reaches the
knife-edge, the wave is split into two components, namely for-
ward- and backward propagating waves. Each wave is marched
out in its own paraxial direction. At each range-step, the re-
flected wave is added to the forward-propagating wave to find
the total wave inside the computational domain. Each time a
wave (forward or backward) reaches one of the knife-edges, it is
split into two components. The algorithm is implemented until
a predetermined convergence criterion is achieved in the entire
domain. It is worthwhile mentioning that the rotation of the di-
rection in the parabolic equation has been employed to com-
pute the bistatic radar cross section of an object embedded in
a homogeneous medium, in the context of the finite difference
method [14]. But, this approach does not account for multiple
reflections, which may occur between different parts of a com-
plicated object, as well as for creeping waves due to the small
features of the object. The main idea of the proposed approach
in this paper is to recursively change the direction of propaga-
tion in forward-backward manner to estimate the multiple-re-
flection effects during electromagnetic propagation over terrain.
Although multiple knife-edges are considered in this paper, the
algorithm can be generalized to any irregular terrain profile in a
straightforward manner.
This paper is organized as follows: Section II summarizes
the basic principles of the parabolic equation/split-step algo-
rithm for the sake of completeness. Section III outlines the im-
plementation procedure of the proposed algorithm. Section IV
presents several representative examples to demonstrate the pro-
posed method in various environment configurations. Finally,
Section V draws some conclusions.
II. OVERVIEW OF FOURIER SPLIT-STEP/PARABOLIC EQUATION
METHOD
In the analysis of tropospheric propagation, we deal with the
two-dimensional (2D) electromagnetic problem, which is gov-
erned by the scalar Helmholtz equation as follows:
(1.a)
or alternatively,
(1.b)
where —in range and altitude—represents one of
the transverse components of the electric or magnetic field in
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2707
horizontal or vertical polarization, respectively. Furthermore,
is the refractive index, which may be range- and
altitude-dependent. The problem is bounded by the ground/sea
at the bottom, and by the top boundary, which is of infinite
extent. We consider the problems where the electromagnetic
waves propagate at small angles from the horizontal direction
(viz., paraxial or -direction). The parabolic (or paraxial) ap-
proximation of the wave equation in (1) is expressed as: (the
suppressed time-dependence is )
(2)
where is the reduced function, which
is assumed to vary slowly in range, is the earth radius, and
is the wave-number. If we ignore the term , which cor-
responds to the earth curvature, the expression in (2) reduces
to the wave equation over flat earth. The parabolic approxima-
tion considers only the forward-propagating waves, and neglects
the backscattered fields. In addition, its accuracy is restricted
to propagation directions that are very close to the horizontal
boundary.
The parabolic approximation converts the problem into an
initial-value problem that can be solved by employing numerical
methods marching in range, in conjunction with the appropriate
boundary conditions. The Fourier split-step method is one of
the most widely-used, efficient and robust algorithm to solve the
parabolic equation, and can easily handle the refractive index in-
homogenities. The algorithm begins at or near the antenna, and
marches out in range (see Fig. 1). In other words, the initial field
is obtained at a reference range by using the antenna pattern, and
then, the solution is advanced in range by calculating the solu-
tion along the vertical (or altitude) direction during each range
step. The field at range is approximated as
(3)
where designates the Fourier Transform, is the transform
variable defined by where is the propagation angle
from the horizontal, and is the modified refractive index given
by . The Fourier Transform is approximated
by Fourier sums on the bounded computational domain, and is
implemented by the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). There are
some important issues in the implementation of the split-step
algorithm. First, the initial field at is obtained by the in-
verse Fourier Transform of the far-field pattern of the antenna in
-space. Second, the Dirichlet and/or Neumann type boundary
conditions over a perfectly conducting surface can be handled
by the Sine and/or Cosine Fourier Transform, depending on the
type of polarization. To realize the algorithm over an imperfectly
conducting surface, the mixed Fourier Transform has been de-
veloped to account for the impedance boundary conditions [6].
Finally, since the Fourier Transform is realized by discretization
(i.e., by FFT), the upper boundary must be truncated in such a
 2708
Fig. 1. Conventional Fourier split-step algorithm.
way that artificial reflections do not occur at the upper boundary.
This is achieved by extending the maximum altitude, and then,
by decreasing the field smoothly in this extended region. The
smooth decay can be ensured by using absorbing regions (such
as perfectly matched layers) or by applying windowing func-
tions (such as Hanning, Hamming, etc.). For detailed analysis
of the Fourier split-step algorithm, the readers are referred to
[2]–[9].
III. IMPLEMENTATION OF THE TWO-WAY RECURSIVE
APPROACH
The two-way Fourier split-step (FSS) algorithm is basically
the consecutive implementation of the conventional FSS algo-
rithm by properly changing the direction of propagation in a
forward-backward fashion to model the irregular surfaces over
terrain. The algorithm is described for multiple knife-edges in
this paper. On the other hand, it can be generalized to any terrain
profile of irregular shape in a straightforward manner by mod-
eling the terrain as a succession of knife-edges, as discussed at
the end of this section.
First, we describe the algorithm by considering a single
knife-edge located at with extension . In other words, the field is reflected once by the edge, and is
Starting from an initial field at , the field is marched out
in the forward direction (i.e., -direction), by using (3) given in
Section II, until the field reaches the knife-edge. When the field
meets the knife-edge at , it is split into two components
propagating in forward and backward directions (or, in and
directions, respectively), as depicted in Fig. 2. The field
propagating in the region is expressed as follows:
where and are the forward and backward prop-
agating fields, respectively. Since the forward-field has already
been calculated by using the initial field at , the total
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 57, NO. 9, SEPTEMBER 2009
field is computed by adding the backward-field, which is ini-
tiated by the forward-field at the edge, to the forward-field. The
initial field of the backward-wave is obtained by imposing the
boundary conditions at the edge. In other words, to satisfy zero
tangential field at the edge, we set the field in (4) to zero at
, and then, express the initial field for the backward-wave
as follows:
(5)
The initial backward-wave is marched out in direction by
solving the parabolic equation in (2), where the sign of is
reversed, as follows:
(6)
Hence, the FSS algorithm is implemented by reversing the signs
of and in (3) to find the backward-field at range ,
as follows:
(7)
The forward-wave in the region is propagated in
-direction in the usual manner, except that the field is truncated
by simply setting it to zero at the edge, as shown in Fig. 2(b).
Thus, the total field, in terms of the forward and backward fields,
is expressed as in (8), shown at the bottom of the page.
For the single knife-edge problem, the two-way FSS algo-
rithm requires only a single forward-backward implementation.
marched back to arrive at the initial range step. When the back-
ward- and forward-waves reach the initial and final range steps,
respectively, the algorithm is terminated. For the problem in-
volving multiple knife-edges, the two-way FSS algorithm is re-
cursively implemented to take into account of the multiple re-
flections, as illustrated in Fig. 3 for two edges. Each time the
field reaches one of the edges, it is separated into two fields
propagating in opposite directions. In this way, when the back-
ward-field, which is reflected from the second edge, reaches
(4) the first edge (see steps 8 and 9 in Fig. 3), it is reflected again
and is marched out in the forward direction. The total field is
then obtained by summing the backward- and forward-fields at
each range step. The contributions of the multiple reflections
decrease rapidly as the recursive calculations are carried out. A
(8)
 OZGUN: RECURSIVE TWO-WAY PARABOLIC EQUATION APPROACH FOR MODELING TERRAIN EFFECTS
Fig. 2. Two-way Fourier split-step algorithm for single-edge: (a) Forward
wave, (b) backward wave. (Empty rectangles represent zero fields).
Fig. 3. Two-way Fourier split-step algorithm for multiple knife-edges.
convenient way to terminate the algorithm is to define a stop-
ping criterion, which is related to the difference between the
total fields at the th and th steps of the algorithm, as
follows:
(9)
where is the threshold (such as, ), and represents
the Euclidian norm. When the ratio in (9) is less than a certain
value , we assume that convergence is achieved because the
total field inside the entire domain do not change significantly
for smaller values of this constant.
The algorithm presented in this section can be generalized
to a general terrain profile by modeling the sloping terrain ef-
fects by staircase approximations (see Fig. 4), which can be
represented as a series of knife-edges. Although the staircase
modeling makes the implementation of the algorithm straight-
forward, it obviously exhibits errors for smooth terrain because
the boundary conditions on sloping facets are not properly taken
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2709
Fig. 4. Staircase approximation of irregular terrain.
Fig. 5. One-way propagation factor for propagation over smooth surface in the
presence of surface duct.
into account. Hence, the proposed algorithm intends to provide
a good approximation to a general terrain profile by incorpo-
rating the multipath effects into the solution of split-step algo-
rithm. It is also worthwhile mentioning that the implementation
of the algorithm for a general terrain profile modeled by stair-
case approximations becomes more involved owing to the in-
creased number of forward-backward propagating waves that
must be handled at once. Hence, as the number of forward-back-
ward propagating waves increases, the memory requirement in-
creases because of the memory allocated for each forward or
backward propagating wave. However, the proposed algorithm
can be parallelized, especially for large scale problems, by using
parallel processing techniques, in such a way that the marching
algorithm of each field component (forward or backward) can
be implemented in different processors by establishing a proper
communication between them. Therefore, we can achieve a sub-
stantial decrease in the overall computation time and memory
when the algorithm is run on multiple processors. Proper paral-
lelization of the proposed algorithm for large scale problems is
still under investigation.
IV. NUMERICAL EXAMPLES
In this section, the results of some numerical experiments are
presented to demonstrate the two-way FSS algorithm in various
environment configurations. The code of the algorithm has been
developed by the author in Matlab by using a 2 GHz-CPU in
an ordinary PC. In all examples, we assume that the frequency
 2710 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 57, NO. 9, SEPTEMBER 2009
M
Fig. 6. Propagation over smooth surface in the presence of surface duct: (a)
Refractivity ( ) profile, (b) propagation factor at 40 km, (c) propagation factor
at 80 km.
is 3 GHz, the polarization is horizontal, the antenna pattern is
Gaussian with vertical beamwidth of 3 , the FFT size is 1024,
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Fig. 7. Single-edge problem: (a) One-way propagation factor, (b) two-way
propagation factor.
the range step is km, the surface is perfectly con-
ducting, and the stopping threshold is (based on nu-
merical observations).
In the implementation of the FSS algorithm, it is common to
define a new quantity, which is related to the modified refrac-
tivity, as follows:
(10)
The modified refractivity in (10) is a useful quantity to specify
the ducting conditions. If the vertical gradient of this quantity
is negative, it represents the atmospheric ducts (viz., wave trap-
ping layers). Such conditions are known as anomalous propa-
gation, which usually has undesirable consequences in, for in-
stance, detecting low-altitude targets, because the trapped en-
ergy within the duct can propagate to ranges beyond the normal
horizon what would be expected with a standard atmosphere.
The general types of ducts are evaporation ducts, surface-based
 OZGUN: RECURSIVE TWO-WAY PARABOLIC EQUATION APPROACH FOR MODELING TERRAIN EFFECTS
Fig. 8. Single-edge problem: (a) Propagation factor in front of the edge (at 22
km), (b) propagation factor at the back of the edge (at 30 km).
ducts and elevated ducts, which may be caused by several me-
teorological conditions.
Before presenting the results of the two-way FSS algorithm,
we test the accuracy of the one-way FSS code. For this purpose,
we consider the propagation over a smooth surface, and com-
pare the results with the ones computed by the AREPS program,
which analyzes only the one-way propagation. We assume a sur-
face-based duct, which has been modeled by the modified-re-
fractivity profile in Fig. 6(a). Between 0 and 135 m, and
above 150 m in altitude, the gradient of the profile is 0.118 m .
Between 135 m and 150 m, which is indeed the ducting layer,
the gradient is assumed to be m . In addition, we as-
sume that the transmitter antenna (TX) is placed at an altitude
of 30 m. We plot the contour of the propagation factor, which is
the field relative to free-space, in Fig. 5. We also plot the prop-
agation factor as a function of altitude at ranges of 40 km and
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2711
Fig. 9. Three knife-edges: (a) One-way propagation factor, (b) two-way prop-
agation factor.
80 km in Fig. 6(b) and (c), respectively. The good agreement
between the results of the FSS algorithm and AREPS validates
the one-way algorithm.
Now, we consider a single knife-edge, whose height is 100
m and position is 25 km in range. We assume standard atmos-
phere, and an antenna height of 50 m. We plot the contour of
the one-way propagation factor by considering only the for-
ward-propagating waves in Fig. 7(a). Next, we implement the
two-way FSS algorithm, and plot the contour in Fig. 7(b). The
interference of the forward- and backward-waves is clearly ob-
served in front of the edge, where the range values are less than
25 km. We compare the results in front of the edge by using the
geometric optics and geometrical theory of diffraction methods,
as shown in Fig. 8(a), for the range at 22 km. At the back of
the knife-edge, the values are exactly the same as the ones in
the one-way propagation. Hence, we compare the results at the
 2712
Fig. 10. Three knife-edges: (a) Convergence profile, (b) difference between the
two-way and one-way propagation factors at 30 km.
back side with the AREPS results, as depicted in Fig. 8(b), for
the range at 30 km.
In the next two examples, we deal with the propagation
involving multiple knife-edges. In both examples, we again as-
sume the surface-based duct that is defined in the first example
[see Fig. 6(a)]. The transmitter antenna is placed at an altitude
of 50 m in both examples. We first consider three edges whose
heights are 75 m, 100 m and 125 m, and which are located at
25, 45, and 80 km, respectively. We plot the contours of the
propagation factor corresponding to the one-way and two-way
algorithms in Fig. 9(a) and (b), respectively. The percentage
difference between the contours of the two algorithms (i.e.,
) is 62%, which shows
that the reflected waves have strong effect on wave propagation.
To show the difference between the one-way and two-way al-
gorithms, we also plot the propagation factor at range of 30 km
as a function of altitude in Fig. 10(b). In the one-way algorithm,
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 57, NO. 9, SEPTEMBER 2009
Fig. 11. Five knife-edges: (a) One-way propagation factor, (b) two-way prop-
agation factor.
the total number of steps that are advanced in range is 333
(i.e., maximum range ), and the computation time is a few
seconds. In the two-way algorithm, the total field converges
in 820 range steps. The waves, propagating back-and-forth
inside the computational domain, hit the first, second and third
edges, 11, 12 and 9 times, respectively, until the convergence
is satisfied. The convergence profile is plotted in Fig. 10(a).
The computation time is approximately 6 mins, which may be
decreased by employing parallel processors.
In the next example, we implement the algorithm for five
knife-edges, whose heights are 50, 100, 75, 50, and 50 m, and
which are positioned at 10, 25, 40, 60, and 85 km, respectively.
We plot the contours of the one-way and two-way algorithms in
Fig. 11(a) and (b), respectively. The percentage difference be-
tween the contours of the two algorithms is calculated as 71%.
The difference between the one-way and two-way propagation
 OZGUN: RECURSIVE TWO-WAY PARABOLIC EQUATION APPROACH FOR MODELING TERRAIN EFFECTS
Fig. 12. Five knife-edges: (a) Convergence profile, (b) difference between the
two-way and one-way propagation factors at 45 km.
factors is illustrated in Fig. 12(b). The two-way algorithm con-
verges in 533 range steps. The convergence profile is shown in
Fig. 12(a). The marching waves hit the first, second, third, fourth
and fifth edges, 9, 9, 10, 10 and 6 times, respectively. The com-
putation time is approximately 4 mins. Finally, in order to show
that the threshold for the stopping criterion is suffi-
cient for convergence, the last simulation has been repeated by
decreasing the threshold to . Then, it has been ob-
served that the percentage difference between the results of the
two cases is only 0.3%. Thus, it has been concluded that the
threshold is sufficient for convergence.
The last example illustrates the algorithm involving irreg-
ular terrain profile, which includes a sharp wedge and rounded
wedge, as shown in Fig. 13. The two-way algorithm converges
in 401 range steps, and in approximately 3.5 mins. The per-
centage difference between the contours of the two algorithms
is calculated as 42%. The contours of the one-way and two-way
algorithms are plotted in Fig. 13(a) and (b), respectively.
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2713
Fig. 13. Irregular terrain: (a) One-way propagation factor, (b) two-way propa-
gation factor.
V. CONCLUSION
In this paper, a two-way Fourier split-step algorithm has been
presented to analyze the forward and backward propagation in
the presence of multiple knife-edges. Unlike the conventional
one-way approaches, the proposed algorithm can handle mul-
tiple reflections, which are more pronounced in the case of ir-
regular terrain profile and atmospheric conditions, by reversing
the paraxial direction each time the wave hits one of the edges.
Basically, in this algorithm, the wave striking into one of the
knife-edges is partially-reflected by imposing the boundary con-
ditions at the edge, and then, the reflected wave is propagated
in the opposite direction. Representative numerical results have
been presented to demonstrate the proposed algorithm.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The author would like to thank Prof. M. Kuzuoglu for his
valuable comments and support.
 2714 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. 57, NO. 9, SEPTEMBER 2009
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Ozlem Ozgun (M’09) received the Ph.D. degree
in electrical engineering from the Middle East
Technical University (METU), Ankara, Turkey, in
2007 and the B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in electrical
engineering from Bilkent University, Ankara, in
1998 and 2001, respectively.
She is currently an Assistant Professor in the
Northern Cyprus Campus of the Middle East Tech-
nical University. From 2007 to 2008, she was a
postdoctoral research fellow in the Electromagnetic
Communication Lab, Pennsylvania State University,
University Park. From 2004 to 2005, she worked in the Aselsan Inc., Microwave
& System Technologies Division, Ankara. From 2000 to 2004, she worked in
the Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK)-National
Research Institute of Electronics & Cryptology (UEKAE), Ankara. Her main
research interests include computational electromagnetics, electromagnetic
propagation and scattering, and metamaterials.
Dr. Ozgun received the METU Thesis of the year award given by METU
Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences in 2007. She is also included
in the 2009 edition of Marquis’ Who’s Who in the World.