Adaptive Beamspace Processing for Phased-Array Weather Radars

The next generation of weather radars, which may also support other missions, is likely to be based on phased arrays that will utilize simultaneous receive beams to achieve the required update times. Some of the disadvantages of using simultaneous receive beams, such as higher two-way antenna radiation pattern sidelobes, can be mitigated by using adaptive beamforming. A majority of the existing adaptive beamforming algorithms are designed for point targets, and direct application to distributed scatterers (e.g., hydrometeors) can lead to significantly biased estimates of key radar variables. This paper presents an adaptive beamspace processing algorithm specifically designed for weather-surveillance radar applications. Through both simulated and real data, it is shown that the proposed adaptive beamspace processing algorithm can produce accurate and calibrated estimates of radar variables while also automatically rejecting interference signals.