COHERENT OPERATION OF A DISTRIBUTED SPARSE ARRAY SPACECRAFT

A PROGRAM IS PROPOSED FOR THE ASSESSMENT OF TECHNIQUES FOR PROVIDING COHERENT OPERATION AND BEAM SYCHRONIZATION IN A DISTRIBUTED SPARSE ARRAY RADAR SYSTEM. THE RADAR SYSTEM CONSIDERED WOULD ADDRESS WIDE AREA SURVEILLANCE MISSIONS AND FUNCTIONS FROM SPACE USING TECHNOLOGY IDENTIFIED IN THE USAF FORECAST II STUDY RECENTLY COMPLETED. THE EFFORT WILL EVALUATE SEVERAL CANDIDATE TECHNIQUES INCLUDING LASER CROSSLINKS, PHASE MATCHING USING KNOWN GROUND TARGETS AND ACCURATE LOCATION OF DISTRIBUTED ELEMENTS USING A DIFFERENTIAL TECHNIQUE EMPLOYING SIGNALS FROM THE GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEM SATELLITES. COMPARATIVE ASSESSMENTS OF CANDIDATE TECHNIQUES WILL BE PERFORMED USING ANALYTIC TECHNIQUES AND COMPUTER MODELS DEVELOPED IN PAST RESEARCH. THE PHASE I EFFORT WILL DESCRIBE AND EVALUATE TECHNIQUES; SELECT THE MOST PROMISING; AND DEVELOP PLANS FOR A PHASE II GROUND EXPERIMENT TO DEMONSTRATE THE KEY ELEMENTS OF THE APPROACH.