Beamforming a circular-polarized radiation pattern on volumetric random arrays with deliberately aligned array antennas

Abstract

This letter proposes a circularly polarized beamforming technique on volumetric random arrays with each antenna aligned deliberately. This technique seeks to advance the capabilities of spatially distributed antenna systems on mobile platforms. Sixteen microstrip patch antennas grouped as the tested array are adopted to investigate the fidelity of the developed beamforming technique. Each array element is distributed randomly and rotated freely to emulate the real mobile environment. Detailed and systematic beamforming procedures are provided and illustrated. Measured radiation patterns of the volumetric random array are compared to the simulated ones to benchmark their performance.