DEVELOPMENT OF MOBILE SURFACE CLUTTER MAPPER

THE CHARACTERIZATION OF CLUTTER IS CRITICAL TO THE DESIGN, DEVELOPMENT, AND TEST OF MODERN MILITARY SEEKER AND RADAR SYSTEMS. THE NATURE OF CLUTTER IS SUCH THAT IT CAN BE CHARACTERIZED ANALYTICALLY ONLY ON A GENERALIZED BASIS; THIS IS OFTEN INADEQUATE TO USE IN THE ASSESSMENT OF SYSTEM PERFORMANCE AND THE DESIGN OF TESTS. THEREFORE, A SYSTEM CAPABLE OF MAPPING THE CLUTTER SCENE AT SPECIFIC SITES WOULD BE A VALUABLE TOOL FOR MILITARY SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT. IN ORDER TO OBTAIN MAXIMUM UTILITY OF THE SYSTEM, IT SHOULD BE FULLY MOBILE AND CAPABLE OF CHARACTERIZING A WIDE DYNAMIC RANGE OF CLUTTER SOURCES. THE POLARIZATION DIVERSE SYSTEM DESCRIBED IS TAILORED FOR THE APPLICATION OF EXISTING HARDWARE COMPLEMENTS, AND UTILIZES THE PRINCIPLES OF SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF THE MAPPING. A CALIBRATION ALGORITHM FOR THE SYSTEM IS DESCRIBED. THE SYSTEM IS CONFIGURED FOR STRAIGHTFORWARD IMPLEMENTATION OF ADDITIONAL FREQUENCY BANDS.