On Clutter Ranks of Frequency Diverse Radar Waveforms

TL;DR

This paper introduces a general frequency diverse radar waveform model called RFD-MIMO, and proposes a method to evaluate its clutter suppression potential by estimating the clutter rank, aiding in waveform comparison.

Contribution

The paper presents a unified RFD-MIMO model for FD waveforms and a novel clutter rank estimation approach to assess clutter suppression capabilities.

Findings

Effective clutter rank estimation method demonstrated through simulations.

The approach enables comparison of clutter suppression performance among FD waveforms.

Numerical results validate the accuracy of the clutter rank evaluation.

Abstract

Frequency diverse (FD) radar waveforms are attractive in radar research and practice. By combining two typical FD waveforms, the frequency diverse array (FDA) and the stepped-frequency (SF) pulse train, we propose a general FD waveform model, termed the random frequency diverse multi-input-multi-output (RFD-MIMO) in this paper. The new model can be applied to specific FD waveforms by adapting parameters. Furthermore, by exploring the characteristics of the clutter covariance matrix, we provide an approach to evaluate the clutter rank of the RFD-MIMO radar, which can be adopted as a quantitive metric for the clutter suppression potentials of FD waveforms. Numerical simulations show the effectiveness of the clutter rank estimation method, and reveal helpful results for comparing the clutter suppression performance of different FD waveforms.