Sidelobe Suppression in Time Modulated Linear Arrays with Unequal Element Spacing

In this paper, an additional degree of freedom "time" is introduced into conventional linear arrays with unequal element spacing forming the time modulated unequally spaced linear arrays (TMUSLAs). The differential evolution (DE) algorithm is adopted to optimize the positions and switch-on times of elements in the TMUSLAs to suppress the sidelobe levels (SLLs), sideband levels (SBLs) and constrain the beamwidth, simultaneously. Numerical results show that lower SLLs and SBLs are obtained by the proposed method than those by the published results.