# Complementary Design of Two Types of Signals for Avionic Phased-MIMO Weather Radar

## TL;DR

This paper introduces a new radar signal design for aircraft to improve weather detection by using two types of signals with different configurations.

## Contribution

The paper proposes a novel signaling strategy using two types of signals for avionic phased-MIMO weather radar to enhance performance.

## Key findings

- Type I signal reduces the near-range blind zone by using long and short pulses in non-overlapping subarrays.
- Type II signal suppresses interference by adjusting sidelobe levels based on contextual information.
- Experiments with real weather data confirm the effectiveness of the proposed signaling strategy.

## Abstract

An avionic weather radar antenna should be able to operate in multiple modes to cope with the change in resolution and elevation coverage as an aircraft approaches a storm cell that could expand 10 km in elevation. To solve this problem, we propose the addition of four auxiliary antenna (AuxAnt) arrays based on the phased-MIMO antenna structure to the existing avionic weather radar for future field data collection missions. Two types of signals are employed: the Type I signal transmitted by AuxAnt 1 and 2 is designed based on a non-overlapping subarray configuration, with Subarray 1 and 2 dedicated to the transmission of long and short pulses, respectively, so that the near-range blind zone is mitigated. Leveraging the waveform design and beamforming flexibility provided by the phased-MIMO antenna, pulse compressions based on frequency modulation and phase-coding are employed for wide and narrow main beams, respectively. To suppress the range sidelobes, adaptive pulse compression is used at the receiver end in substitute of the conventional matched filter. In contrast, the Type II signal transmitted by AuxAnt 3 and 4 is designed based on the contextual information so that the transmitted beampatterns have specific sidelobe levels at certain directions for interference suppression. The advantages of the proposed signaling strategy are verified with a series of ingeniously devised experiments based on real weather data.