Moving Target Detection Using a Moving Platform-Based Distributed Coherent Aperture Radar System

This study presents a moving platform-based distributed coherent aperture radar (MDCAR) system. A meter-band MDCAR system can significantly improve target detection and resolution performance and increase reconnaissance and surveillance abilities due to the advantages of movability and flexible deployment. This system consists of three unit radars connected wirelessly. Due to the wireless connection, all the unit radars can be incoherent, so it is necessary to perform time and phase synchronization before the system is used for target detection. To realize wireless synchronizations, this study adopts a closed-loop topology. In addition, a coherent parameter acquisition approach, including a multi-pulse accumulation coherent parameter estimation algorithm and a parameter prediction algorithm, is proposed to achieve high accuracy synchronization. The proposed distributed radar system is verified by the aircraft detection experiments conducted in Yiyang, Hunan, China. The experimental results show that an 11.14-dB signal-to-noise ratio improvement over a single unit radar can be realized in moving scenarios, which demonstrates the high coherence performance of the proposed system.