Next-Generation Air Deployable Active Receiver (ADAR)

"A crucial factor in sonar design is the benefit available from increased aperture. Current sonobuoys have been constrained to the A-size configuration. Development of the ADAR system has been a significant success in packaging and deployment of such acomplex sensor in the small A-size format. With the Deployable Active Passive Sonar (DAPS), we propose to increase the physical aperture and add a vertical component, while maintaining as much of the ADAR design as practical. The compact DAPS apertureoffers significant horizontal ABF gain without the burden of long integration times needed by long horizontal apertures. Its vertical aperture offers the added rejection of vertical components of the noise (including reverberation). The increasedaperture over ADAR allows processing at lower frequencies to take advantage of improved propagation. Thus, DAPS can provide significant passive and active performance in the littoral regions of the world. During Phase I, ORINCON will demonstrate thisimproved performance through simulation. Detailed questions of longevity, packaging for deployment, survivability, and communications of acquired information will also be addressed. For Phase II, two prototype DAPS units will be assembled and tested atsea. In Phase III, DAPS will be taken to a production configuration and qualified for deployment by aircraft, surface ships, and submarines. Through the increased detection performance of DAPS,