Synthesis of uniform amplitude focused beam arrays

An iterative algorithm to synthesize uniform amplitude focused beam arrays is presented. While the number of array elements and the excitations are fixed and known, the locations of the elements are optimized to radiate a narrow beam low sidelobe pattern. The method can be applied to both linear and planar arrays composed of elements having arbitrary radiation patterns. Although any excitation can be considered, elements having the same fixed amplitude and phase are targeted because of their pratical interest. On top of being easy to implement, the proposed procedure leads to array designs that compare favorably to solutions found in the literature.