Shaping an antenna radiation diagram with discrete weights using the PSO algorithm and periodic and nest spaces

Using traditional methods, finding the weights that allow shaping a desired radiation diagram for an antenna in order to reject unwanted signals or maximize the desired signal reception, is possible. However, neither by iterative nor closed methods, can it be done while restricting the amplitudes and phases to a set of finite values for each of them. Also, it often happens that they cannot include in its formulation other types of specifications that are necessary to be achieved. Some modifications were implemented in the method Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), which reduced the convergence time, especially in the search space of phases where there exists a periodicity that the original method does not take into account. PSO is an evolutionary algorithm, inspired by the social behavior of flocks of birds or fish, developed by Eberhart and Kennedy in 1995, and has been intensively applied in solving numerical Engineering problems. © 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.