Research on a Novel Method for High-speed Target Detection and Motion Parameter Estimation

In radar detection, long-time coherent integration (LTCI) is widely used to enhance the detection performance of high-speed targets. However, its effectiveness is fundamentally limited by motion-induced range migration (RM) and Doppler frequency migration (DFM), which cause significant degradation in coherent integration performance. To address this issue, this paper proposes a novel method for high-speed target detection and parameter estimation based on the range frequency reversing transform, Lv’s distribution, and frequency-domain derampkeystone transform (RFRT-LVD-FDDKT). First, the RFRT algorithm is applied to correct RM and extract the echo signal along the slow-time dimension. Then, the LVD algorithm is used to estimate the target’s acceleration and to compensate for the RM and DFM that it induces. Finally, the FDDKT algorithm is used to estimate the target’s velocity and further corrects RM, thereby achieving coherent integration. Detailed comparisons show that, compared to the RFRT and second-order Wigner-Ville Distribution (RFRT-SoWVD) algorithm, the proposed RFRT-LVD-FDDKT algorithm improves detection ability by approximately 4 dB while maintaining comparable computational complexity. Moreover, the effectiveness of the proposed method is validated using real radar data.