Real-time Range/Doppler Migration Mitigation Techniques for Enhanced Moving Target Detection

This SBIR project aims to address one of the greatest challenges in the Counter-Rocket, Artillery and Mortar (C-RAM) area, i.e., high-speed low-RCS target detection. To tackle this challenge, an innovative moving target detection scheme, including a simple but effective range/Doppler migration mitigation algorithm, is proposed. Our preliminary evaluation indicates that the proposed approach can significantly enhance moving target detection performance via increasing the coherent processing interval (CPI), and is able to automatically resolve the Doppler ambiguity problem. Moreover, the proposed approach has comparable computational complexity to existing moving target detection algorithms. Hence, it can be incorporated into currently fielded or future radar systems without requiring any hardware modifications. In Phase I, we will refine and customize the proposed approach, and will fully evaluate its technical feasibility in terms of effectiveness, robustness, computational complexity, memory requirement, and implementation simplicity using both simulated and SRC field-collected data. In Phase II, we will integrate the proposed algorithm into a hardware radar platform for real-time performance evaluations and demonstration.