Patent ID: 7710340

Claim:
An antenna system for generating and configuring at least one defocused beam, the antenna system comprising: a reflector having a focal plane and a non-parabolic curvature that forms the at least one defocused beam; a plurality of feed antennas that illuminate the reflector, each feed antenna being disposed in the focal plane of the reflector; at least one incoming signal dividing network that divides at least one incoming signal into a plurality of sub-signals, each sub-signal corresponding to one of the plurality of feed antennas; a plurality of variable phase shifters, each variable phase shifter receiving one of the plurality of sub-signals from the at least one incoming signal dividing network and phase shifting the one of the plurality of sub-signals to generate a corresponding phase-shifted sub-signal; a plurality of fixed-amplitude amplifiers, at least one amplifier corresponding to each of the plurality of feed antennas, the at least one amplifier for each feed antenna amplifying the corresponding phase-shifted sub-signal to generate an amplified phase-shifted sub-signal which is provided to the corresponding feed antenna, wherein the curvature of the reflector creates a symmetrical quadratic phase-front in an aperture plane of the reflector.