Compact Radar Technology For Over the Horizon Small-Boat and Semi-Submersible Detection and Tracking

Over-The-Horizon (OTH) radar plays a crucial role in naval situational awareness and the ultimate safety of the naval warfighter and navy assets. Traditionally, OTH detection has been enabled by large land based radars exploiting the interaction of high frequency (HF) radio waves with the ionosphere, but this method is susceptible to instabilities in propagation and the limitations of HF systems. In addition, land based or air/space based target information operate on time scales much slower than required for todays naval fleet. The utilization of evaporation duct propagation with much higher frequency microwave signals can provide a compact OTH sensor that is small enough to be deployed on surface vessels and provide timely detection, localization, and characterization of small, low-altitude and sea surface targets at ranges that are tactically relevant. Such a system has the potential to revolutionize situational awareness and provide the ability to quickly react to immediate threats. The goal of this Phase I STTR is to investigate and develop a compact Ka band OTH radar for detection of small surface targets. In particular, we will develop and investigate the performance gains of a MIMO framework for OTH SMTI operation utilizing evaporation duct propagation. The result of the Phase I will be a complete concept design for our Halcyon software defined MIMO Radar system.