Adaptive null formation with a reconfigurable reflector antenna

The paper reports on a reconfigurable mesh reflector antenna which adaptively adjusts the reflector surface so as to produce a pattern null in the direction of an interfering source. Deep nulls in the sidelobe region are formed after less than 50 iterations, with little degradation of the remainder of the pattern. An experimental system based on a reconfigurable mesh reflector antenna has been built and used to demonstrate the techniques. It is believed that this represents the first demonstration of adaptive nulling using control of a reflector surface rather than the excitations of array or feed array elements. Applications lie where there is no a priori knowledge of the interference location which includes both civil and military scenarios.