In this paper, the design of thinned planar antenna arrays of isotropic radiators with optimum side lobe level reduction is studied. The teaching–learning-based optimization (TLBO) method, a newly proposed global evolutionary optimization method, is used to determine an optimum set of turned-ON elements of thinned planar antenna arrays that provides a radiation pattern with optimum side lobe level reduction. The TLBO represents a new algorithm for optimization problems in antenna arrays design. It is shown that the TLBO provides results that are better than (or the same as) those obtained using other evolutionary algorithms.
