Complex Permittivity Extraction of Polymer Materials Using Gradient-Enhanced NSGA-II Algorithm

This paper presents gradient-enhanced non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (G-NSGA-II) to address the challenges of local optima and solution non-uniqueness in the complex permittivity extraction problem for the first time. This adaptive hybrid algorithm integrates the global exploration capability of NSGA-II with gradient-based local refinement, triggered by a population-stagnation detection mechanism. Furthermore, multi-dimensional constraints are incorporated by jointly optimizing transmission and reflection coefficients across multiple sample thicknesses. Experimental validation conducted on six typical polymers in the 20–40 GHz band demonstrates that the retrieved relative permittivity and thicknesses are in high agreement with literature values and physical measurements. Compared to standard heuristic and gradient-based algorithms, the proposed G-NSGA-II reduces the number of generations required for convergence by approximately 50%. This significant improvement in speed, combined with enhanced robustness, provides a highly reliable and efficient solution for broadband dielectric characterization in architectural and electromagnetic engineering. The simple measurement method and the proposed efficient algorithm allow for a rapid evalutaion of wireless performance within indoor environments. This approach serves as a valuable tool for optimizing existing wireless layouts and improving network performance.