Patent ID: 8031117

Claim:
A communications device for separating source signals provided by M signal sources, the communications device comprising: an antenna array comprising N fixed antenna elements for receiving at least N different summations of the M source signals, at least two of said N fixed antenna elements being correlated and having different polarizations for receiving at least two of the N different summations of the M source signals, with N and M being greater than 1, the at least two of said N antenna elements being spaced apart so that a distance D between any two immediately adjacent antenna elements is less than a wavelength λ of the operating frequency of the communications device, where 0<D<λ, said N fixed antenna elements comprising at least one active antenna element and up to N−1 passive antenna elements so that said antenna array forms a switched beam antenna; a receiver connected to said antenna array for receiving the at least N different summations of the M source signals; and a blind signal separation processor connected to said receiver for forming a mixing matrix comprising the at least N different summations of the M source signals, the mixing matrix having a rank equal to at least N, said blind signal separation processor for separating desired source signals from the mixing matrix.