Liteweight UAV MMW SAR/MTI Radar System (LUAVR)

The team of GE and MMCOMM will develop a TRL 6 prototype of the Lightweight UAV SAR / MTI Radar (LUAVR) System. This system will be designed to a weight of less than 10 lbs and will feature advanced and innovative MMW technology and signal processing.The system will feature a proprietary liteweight antenna and all solid state MMIC design. Advanced direct digital synthesis (DDS) waveform generation, advanced digital down conversion (DDC) using FPGA and advanced signal processing will be incorporated.The system will detect slow moving targets down to 1 square meter cross section and 2 m/s velocity. The SAR mode will feature resolutions down to 0.1 m both down range and cross range. A combination of motion measurement sensor (MMS) and signal basedmocomp will be incorporated to insure high image quality. The system will be fabricated by extending and upgrading legacy Ka-band FMCW MMIC hardware designs to meet the requirements being evolved for the LUAVR. The signal processing will be based onadapting legacy SAR image formation processing (IFP), motion compensation and GMTI algorithms. The system will be tested in two phases: roof-top testing of the MTI mode and vehicle testing of the MTI and SAR modes.The U S Army will mature lightweight MMWSAR/MTI technology and develop a system for installation on a small UAV that can be used to support small unit operations. In addition MMW component technology will be developed that can be applied to other applications, as well as being used to expand theexisting line of commercially available components and subsystems.