Switched parasitic elements for antenna diversity

Switched parasitic elements provide a useful implementation of antenna pattern diversity. The basic principle is presented with some examples of wire antennas computed using the method of moments. The modeled diversity gain available from selection combining of uncorrelated signals is used to quantify the expected improvement relative to nondiversity antennas. The advantage of the switched parasitic concept is that it is a relatively simple system, which can give the adaptive antenna performance of many branch selection or switched diversity.