Antennas: Isotropic Radiators and Beam Forming/Beam Steering

In this chapter, a simple MATLAB package (ARRAY), accommodated with beam steering capabilities, is designed and introduced which plots two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) radiation patterns of a number of selected and user-located isotropic radiators. An isotropic radiator is a hypothetical, lossless antenna occupying a point in space and, when transmitting, radiates uniformly in all directions. The chapter provides geometrical parameters associated with this problem. The ARRAY package allows the user to choose from a popup menu (a) arbitrary, (b) linear, (c) planar, or (d) circular arrays with a number of user-selected and located isotropic radiators. The ARRAY package is used to plot 2D and 3D radiation patterns of various types of antenna arrays, and some examples of these are given in the chapter.