Feasibility of asteroid detection using pulsar signals

The feasibility of a Forward Scatter Radar (FSR) system, which exploits pulsars as opportunity transmitters, is examined. We provide a power budget estimate for asteroid detection using such a FSR system and assume the use of the higher-gain radio telescopes as the receivers. The numerical results are obtained for three types of pulsars and large asteroids, whose diameters equal and overcome 150 m.