A Novel Ultra-Wideband Wide-angle Scanning Sparse Array Antenna using Genetic Algorithm

A single-element antenna is usually unable to meet the communication requirements of the wire-less system and the main solution is to use an array antenna. The desire to reduce the weight and cost of the array antenna gave rise to the sparse array. A lin-early polarized sparse array antenna with ultra-wideband wide-angle scanning characteristics based on a genetic algorithm (GA) is developed in this paper. The antenna array consists of 40 units, which are arranged by a rectangular array with a side length of 300 mm. Com-pared to the conventional periodic array, the proposed sparse array has reduced about 190 antenna elements. The sparse array can achieve S11 < -10 dB in the ultra-wideband of 2.7-12 GHz (120%). Experimental results for the proposed antenna exhibit an azimuth scanning angle of & PLUSMN;45 & DEG;, and a pitching scanning angle of & PLUSMN;30 & DEG;.