Patent ID: 11916291
Assignee: DUKE UNIVERSITY
Field: Telecommunications (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC H | IPC H

Claim 18:
19. A system comprising:
one or more processors; and
at least one computer-readable storage medium having stored therein instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations comprising:
identify characteristics of one or more of a plurality of tunable elements in a traveling-wave antenna array comprising a plurality of adjacent traveling-wave antennas, wherein each adjacent traveling wave antenna includes a radiating waveguide or cavity and a plurality of tunable elements that are arranged in a single direction along a surface of the radiating waveguide or cavity, wherein the plurality of tunable elements are spaced at, near, or above a Nyquist limit spacing for the traveling-wave antenna array to form an array of tunable elements across the traveling-wave antenna array; and
model a response of the adjacent traveling-wave antennas in generating specific output radiation patterns from input including phase diverse input fed to two or more of the plurality of adjacent traveling-wave antennas over tuning values along one or more ranges of one or more tuning variables applied through a plurality of grayscale tuning elements to generate the specific output radiation patterns, wherein the phase diverse input is fed by a phase diversity feed coupled to a corresponding aperture of each adjacent traveling-wave antenna in the traveling-wave antenna array, the phase diversity feed comprising a feed waveguide or an array of passive phase shifters that is separate from each radiating waveguide or cavity, the feed waveguide or an array of passive phase shifters providing a selected phase diverse input to two or more of the plurality of adjacent traveling-wave antennas, the phase diverse input comprising a first phase for a first traveling-wave antenna and a second phase for a second traveling-wave antenna, wherein the first and second phases are specifically selected based on the identified characteristics of the traveling-wave antenna array to suppress or eliminate grating lobes in the specific output radiation patterns.