Rapid simulation-based design of covered planar microstrip patch antenna arrays by means of radiation response surrogates

A technique for rapid simulation-based design of planar antenna arrays is presented. The proposed approach is based on establishing a suitable correction of the analytical array factor model of the array of interest. The corrected array factor is utilized as a fast surrogate allowing us to find the optimum element spacing and phase excitations at low computational cost. The correction terms are iteratively refined to account for design-dependent discrepancies between the array factor model and the EM-simulated one. Our methodology is demonstrated through the design of a 10 GHz planar 10-by-10 array of microstrip patch antennas with a plastic cover.