Diversity considerations in wideband radar detection of migrating targets in clutter

Abstract

Wideband radars have been proposed for detection of moving targets, with unique capability of non-ambiguous detection due to range migration. Moreover, frequency diversity has long been used for mitigating the fading effects caused by target and clutter fluctuations. The real benefits of wideband radars are difficult to analyze, since they derive from the combined effects of target resolution in range, migration over successive cells of clutter, Doppler resolution and instantaneous bandwidth, and residual ambiguities in Doppler. In order to contribute to a better understanding of the benefits of agile transmissions for detection of moving targets, clutter cancelling performances of wideband radars are examined, demonstrating clear benefits from diversity on clutter and target, primarily – but not only – obtained through target migration effects. Special attention is given to long-range surveillance and tracking, and new results on detection of moving targets in clutter will be provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of these new architectures for small targets detection at long range, in difficult environments. Finally, recommendations for system designs that improve the discrimination of moving targets against fixed and diffuse clutter are presented.