MIMO Phased-Array for SMTI Radar

Waveform diversity techniques for radar have gained considerable interest over the past several years. Novel radar waveforms have been proposed to improve detection performance and metric accuracy (i.e., angle estimation performance). This paper explores the potential for using a waveform diversity technique known as multiple input, multiple output (MIMO) radar to improve the detection performance of slow moving surface targets from a moving radar platform. The MIMO radar system achieves superior performance by transmitting unique uncorrelated waveforms from each antenna subaperture as opposed to the traditional approach of transmitting a single coherent waveform across the entire aperture. The results show that the radar system minimum detectable velocity (MDV) can be reduced by exploiting the ability of a MIMO system to effectively increase the radar antenna aperture.