Phased array with movable antennas and beampattern synthesis

In this paper, we propose a novel phased array with movable antennas (PAMA). By replacing traditional phase shifters with movable antennas, PAMA eliminates insertion loss of phase shifters and enhances antenna performance by leveraging the increased degrees of freedom in antenna positioning. We construct a periodic approximation-based beampattern synthesis (PABS) method. It leverages the approximate periodicity of the PAMA array response to obtain a high-quality initial solution through discrete optimization with quadruple-frequency sampling, which is subsequently refined using projected gradient descent. Simulations demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach for multi-beampattern synthesis and highlight the impact of antenna movement range on synthesis performance. The results show that PAMA-based beampattern synthesis enhances beamforming accuracy and improves efficiency, especially in practical scenarios where digital phase shifters are used.

Phased array with movable antennas and beampattern synthesis

Kewei Zhu, Haifan Yin, Huazhong University of Science and Technology; Deepak Mishra, University of New South Wales (UNSW) Sydney; Jinhong Yuan, University of New South Wales