Characterization of resonant elements for passive and reconfigurable reflectarray design

The performance of individual reflectarray resonant elements drives the overall performance of the reflectarray antenna. This work proposes novel configurations of reflectarray unit cells with different slot configurations embedded on the patch elements. A detailed theoretical analysis on the scattering energy is provided for the reflectarray antenna design. The proposed designs are categorized based on the capability of frequency tunability and dynamic phase range obtained by varying the dimensions of the slots on the patch elements. Measured and simulated results demonstrate a very close agreement where rectangular slots provide a measured frequency tunability of 1.68 GHz and dynamic phase range of 332° at 9.66 GHz while the design with circular slots provides a measured frequency tunability of 1.46 GHz and dynamic phase range of 330° at 10.27 GHz.