The automated design of meander line RFID antennas is a discrete self-avoiding walk(SAW) problem for which efficiency is to be maximized while resonant frequency is to beminimized. This work presents a novel exploration of how discrete local search may beincorporated into a continuous solver such as differential evolution (DE). A prior DE algorithmfor this problem that incorporates an adaptive solution encoding and a bias favoringantennas with low resonant frequency is extended by the addition of the backbite localsearch operator and a variety of schemes for reintroducing modified designs into the DEpopulation. The algorithm is extremely competitive with an existing ACO approach and thetechnique is transferable to other SAW problems and other continuous solvers. The findingsindicate that careful reintegration of discrete local search results into the continuous populationis necessary for effective performance
