Recent computational and technological advances in the analysis and design of reflectarray antennas

In this paper, two different topics are covered. On the one hand, a new hybrid spectral/spatial domain method of moments (MoM) approach is introduced for the analysis of multilayered periodic structures. This hybrid MoM approach has been used for the design of a dual-polarization contoured beam reflectarray antenna made of sets of three rectangular stacked patches, and it has proven to be between one and two orders of magnitude faster than the conventional pure spectral domain MoM approach. On the other hand, a new reflectarray element is introduced. The new element consists of two orthogonal sets of four parallel dipoles that are arranged in two metallization levels for independent polarizations. A dual-polarization focused beam reflectarray antenna based on this new element has been designed, manufactured and measured. The antenna shows a large bandwidth (27%) with lower fabrication complexity and lower cross-polarization than other reported wideband reflectarray antennas based on alternative elements.