Mutual coupling compensation in small phased array antennas

A new technique to compensate for the mutual coupling effect in small phased array antennas is presented. This method is a modification to the classical approach for correcting the array output vector by multiplication of a decoupling matrix to achieve a less unperturbed array response. Two different methods of calculating coupling coefficients between array elements are presented. The performance is demonstrated by a simulation based on a numerical analysis with the finite element method (FEM) and a practical application to a digital beamforming (DBF) array.