Beamsteering and Beamshaping Using a Linear Antenna Array with Particle Swarm Optimization

This paper discusses the architecture of an adaptive transmitting microstrip array that allows beamsteering and beamshaping with high flexibility. The structure is controlled digitally by an field programmable gate array (FPGA) board. The power and phase of the signals to be delivered to the array elements are optimized by an algorithm based on particle swarm optimization (PSO), including all electromagnetic effects such as mutual coupling and platform influences. The efficiency of the proposed approach is validated by measurements for different beam steering conditions including side lobe level control and beam shaping for squared cosecant and isoflux contours. The paper addresses several implementation aspects that are not commonly found in the literature, such as the compensation of faulty antennas or transmitting channels whilst still synthesizing radiation patterns with high complexity