Reconfigurable patch antennas for steerable reflectarray applications

Reconfigurable reflectarrays have been designed with patch elements which can vary the reflected phase by varying the height of the patches. These patches have been designed using a periodic method of moments simulation. Reflectarrays incorporating elements of varying heights have been built and tested. The first design is a 33 element array comprised of stacked patches which operates at 7.31 GHz. The second design is a 120-element dipole array over a ground plane which operates at 5.2 GHz. Microelectrical, mechanical systems actuation technology could be used to implement these designs and a potential concept is suggested