Clutter-limited detection performance of multi-channel conformal arrays

Authors:
R. K. Hersey;W. L. Melvin;J. H. McClellan
Affiliations:
Sensors & Electromagnetic Applications Laboratory, Georgia Tech Research Institute, 7220 Richardson Rd., Smyrna, GA and Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Tech ...;Sensors & Electromagnetic Applications Laboratory, Georgia Tech Research Institute, 7220 Richardson Rd., Smyrna, GA;Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 777 Atlantic Dr, Atlanta, GA
Venue:
Signal Processing - Special section: New trends and findings in antenna array processing for radar
Year:
2004

Citing 2
Cited 1

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Exact performance of STAP algorithms with mismatched steering andclutter statistics

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Abstract

Conformal arrays possess certain desirable characteristics for deployment on unmanned aerial vehicles and other payload-limited platforms: aerodynamic design, minimal payload weight, increased field of view without the need for cumbersome mechanical couplings and rotary joints, and ease of integration with diverse sensor functions. This paper examines the adaptive detection performance potential of aerospace moving target indication radar employing a conformal antenna array. We consider four candidate conformal designs taking the following shapes: belly-mounted canoe, airfoil, cone and chined radome. Furthermore, we compare results to side- and forward-looking planar arrays. We find that array nonlinearity and orientation induce clutter non-stationarity; this non-stationary behavior adversely affects space-time adaptive processing implementations necessary for effective clutter suppression. We find that additional adaptive losses exceed 12 dB as a result of conformal geometry-induced clutter non-stationarity. Several mitigating solutions to non-stationarity are given.