Patent ID: 6911954

Claim:
A method for constructing an antenna system from a plurality of antenna elements, the method comprising: specifying an antenna system radiation pattern function that describes the transmission or reception pattern of the antenna system; determining an element radiation pattern function for each element of the antenna system, each element radiation pattern function including a basic element pattern specification, a frequency of operation and at least one spacing parameter that specifies the location of the element in the antenna system; determining a value for the at least one spacing parameter; forming a set whose elements are the element radiation pattern functions and imposing a condition on the elements of the set such that the set is identifiable as a first frame; determining a second frame that is a dual of the first frame, the second frame having an equal number of elements as the first frame; determining an element weight coefficient for each antenna element based on the elements of the second frame and the specified antenna system radiation pattern function; and constructing the antenna system from the plurality of antenna elements according to the at least one spacing parameter and determined element weight coefficients for each element at the frequency of operation.