A Framework for Understanding: Deriving the Radar Range Equation
●For engineers and scientists, the names behind the earliest experiments in electromagnetism are part of our everyday conversations: Heinrich Hertz, James Clerk Maxwell and Nikola Tesla. If we fast forward from their work in the late 19th and early 20st centuries to radar systems in the 21st century, the fundamental concept—metallic objects reflect radio waves—has evolved into a variety of technologies that meet specific needs in terms of performance, cost, size, and capability. These are pushed to the limits in military applications: detecting, ranging, tracking, evading, and jamming.
As in commercial electronics and communications, the evolution from purely analog designs to hybrid analog/digital designs continues to drive advances in capability and performance. In radar systems, frequencies keep reaching higher and signals are becoming increasingly agile. Signal formats and modulation schemes—pulsed and otherwise—continue to become more complex, and this demands wider bandwidth.
Advanced digital signal processing (DSP) techniques are being used to disguise system operation and thereby avoid jamming. Architectures such as active electronically steered arrays (AESA) rely on advanced materials such as gallium nitride (GaN) to implement phased-array antennas that provide greater performance in beamforming and beamsteering.
The most extreme example is a phased-array radar that has thousands of transmit/receive (T/R) modules operating in tandem. These often rely on a variety of sophisticated techniques to improve performance: sidelobe nulling, staggered pulse-repetition interval (PRI), frequency agility, real-time waveform optimization, wideband chirps, and target-recognition capability.
Within the operating environment, the range of complexities may include ground clutter, sea clutter, jamming, interference, wireless communication signals, and other forms of electromagnetic noise. It may also include multiple targets, many of which utilize materials and technologies that present a reduced radar cross section (RCS).
All these modern complexities rely on a mathematical foundation: the radar range equation.
●The radar series
■This application note is the first in a series that delves into radar systems and the associated measurement challenges and solution. Across the series, our goal is to provide a mix of timeless fundamentals and emerging ideas.
In each note, many of the sidebars highlight solutions—hardware and software—that include future-ready capabilities that can track along with the continuing evolution of radar systems.
Whether you read one, some or all of the notes in the series, we hope you find material—timeless or timely—that is useful in your day-to-day work, be it on new designs or system upgrades.
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[ Radar ] |
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Application note & Design Guide |
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Please see the document for details |
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English Chinese Chinese and English Japanese |
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June 28, 2018 |
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5992-1386EN |
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1.8 MB |
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