Reflectarray with arbitrarily-shaped conductive elements optimized by genetic algorithm

This paper proposes an optimization design method to obtain arbitrarily-shaped conductive elements for microstrip reflectarrays. Such arbitrarily-shaped elements are determined by using the genetic algorithm (GA) based on a spectral-domain moment method. The validity of the designed elements is presented by comparing the calculated reflection-phase property for a periodic reflectarray with the measured one. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed elements is verified by discussing radiation characteristics of the fabricated offset reflectarray numerically and experimentally.