Digital beamforming for an electronically scanned radar system
First Claim
1. An electronically scanned radar system comprising:
- a predetermined number of antenna elements for transmitting a received signal to a receiver;
a time multiplexed switch matrix for timing the transmission of the received signal from the antenna elements to the receiver; and
a Doppler function for managing a target motion induced phase shift across the antenna elements.
5 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Digital beamforming is provided for use with electronically scanned radar. In an aspect, the present invention provides enhanced sensitivity, wide angle or field of view (FOV) coverage with narrow beams, minimized number of receivers, reduced sidelobes, eliminated grating lobes and beam compensation for target motion. In an aspect, the present invention employs a uniform overlapped subarray feed network, a time multiplexed switch matrix, and a restructured digital signal processor. Antenna channels share a receiver, rather than maintain a dedicated receiver for each antenna element, as in conventional systems. In an aspect, Doppler/frequency filtering is performed on each antenna element or subarray output prior to digital beamforming. Further, Doppler compensation is employed following Doppler/frequency filtering, followed by digital beamforming.
-
Citations
20 Claims
-
1. An electronically scanned radar system comprising:
-
a predetermined number of antenna elements for transmitting a received signal to a receiver;
a time multiplexed switch matrix for timing the transmission of the received signal from the antenna elements to the receiver; and
a Doppler function for managing a target motion induced phase shift across the antenna elements. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
-
-
10. A method of digital beamforming in an electronically scanned radar system comprising:
-
forming a predetermined number of antenna elements to transmit a received signal to a receiver;
forming a time multiplexed switch matrix to time the transmission of the received signal from the antenna elements to the receiver; and
utilizing a Doppler function to manage a target motion induced phase shift across the antenna elements. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
-
-
17. An electronically scanned radar system comprising:
-
a predetermined number of antenna elements for transmitting a received signal to a receiver;
an overlapped subarray feed network for receiving the received signals from the antenna elements, and for forming a predetermined phase center spacing to define a location of a grating lobe; and
a time multiplexed switch matrix for receiving the received signals from the overlapped subarray feed network, and for timing the transmission of the received signals to the receiver. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20)
-
Specification