Coherent Signal Processing for Loosely Coupled Bistatic Radar

Gottinger M, Gulden P, Vossiek M (2021)

Publication Language: English

Publication Type: Journal article, Review article

Publication year: 2021

Journal

IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

Book Volume: 3

Pages Range: 1855-1871

Journal Issue: 57

DOI: 10.1109/TAES.2021.3050650

Abstract

Sensitivity and performance of homodyne radar are notably improved if the phase noise terms of transmit and receive signals are correlated and cancelled out by the receiver. However, in a bistatic setup with separate oscillators, this correlation is inherently not given. To achieve a good carrier phase and phase noise coherency it is required to transmit a radio frequency (RF) reference e.g. by using high-quality RF cables, optical fibers or wireless point-to-point links. All these options are complex, costly and prone to distortions and signal delay variations. Sharing a clock signal is also barely helpful, since even small distortions of this reference are converted to notable uncorrelated phase noise in the radar signal synthesizers. In this paper, a novel full-duplex system concept and signal processing scheme is presented that solves the above-mentioned problems completely. This concept allows for coherent measurements within a bistatic radar setup, even if the two radar stations are only loosely coupled employing a simple clock-rate adjustment. By theory and experimental results with bistatic frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) radar it is shown that our concept allows for bistatic measurements with the same sensitivity and performance that is usually know from homodyne radar systems. To the authors' best knowledge, this is the first time that phase noise coherent measurements in a bistatic multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) radar setup are shown. This concept paves the way for advanced netted radar setups e.g. in automotive radar and applications with large apertures or baselines or multi-perspective coherent tomographic measurements.

Authors with CRIS profile

Michael Gottinger Lehrstuhl für Hochfrequenztechnik (LHFT) Martin Vossiek Lehrstuhl für Hochfrequenztechnik (LHFT)

Involved external institutions

Indie Semiconductor US United States (USA) (US)

How to cite

APA:

Gottinger, M., Gulden, P., & Vossiek, M. (2021). Coherent Signal Processing for Loosely Coupled Bistatic Radar. IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems, 3(57), 1855-1871. https://doi.org/10.1109/TAES.2021.3050650

MLA:

Gottinger, Michael, Peter Gulden, and Martin Vossiek. "Coherent Signal Processing for Loosely Coupled Bistatic Radar." IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems 3.57 (2021): 1855-1871.

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