Development of an Uplink Array Radar System for Cis-Lunar and Planetary Observations

The use of an Uplink Array Radar system for cis-lunar and planetary observations could provide a high-power option that is both scalable and resilient, subject only to graceful degradation. Due to the monolithic antenna design of the Goldstone Solar System Radar (GSSR), the transmitter power of the GSSR can only be increased by installing higher power klystrons, which are likely reaching their limit around 250 kW. By contrast, the Uplink Array Radar concept is a distributed system that coherently combines lower power C-band signals from multiple 34 meter antennas at the target, producing a reliable high power radar system that can serve as a viable backup to the GSSR. As described in this paper, our goal is to demonstrate a high-power wideband Phased Array Transmitter concept to meet requirements for planetary science, planetary defense, and cis-lunar space situational awareness, by configuring two of the Deep Space Network's (DSN) high-power 34 meter antennas, namely DSS-13 and DSS-26, as a coherent Uplink Array Radar transmitter.