RADIOLOCATION

DOPPLER BASED RADARS

CW Radar – Pulse Doppler Radar – Moving Target Indicator – FMCW

RADIOLOCATION Jordi Mateu – Jordi Berenguer

Course Contents
I. Introduction to Air Navigation and Surveillance Functions.
II. Pulsed Radar.
III. Radar Clutter.
IV. Doppler based Radars.
V. Tracking Radars.
VI. Secondary Surveillance Radar (SSR).
VII. Automatic Dependent Surveillance (ADS).
VIII.Airborne Collision Avoidance System (ACAS).
IX. Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning Systems.
X. Weather Radar.

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Radar Doppler

1. Doppler Effect 5. Digital processing for MTI

Radar
2. Continuous Wave Radar 1. Blind phase.
2. I / Q channels.
1. Homodyne Radar
2. Heterodyne Radar 5. FM-CW Radar
3. Pulse Doppler Radar to 1. Radio altimeter.
extract frequency shift. 2. Navigation Radar
3. Surface Movement Radar
4. MTI Radar (SMR)
1. Cancellers
1. Transfer function of a canceller
6. Pulsed Radio Altimeter
2. Attenuation Clutter
3. Two stages Canceller
7. Ambiguity Function
4. Improving factor
5. Circuit or N-pulse canceller

2. Transversal filter
3. Staggered PRF
Christian Andreas Doppler
4. Doppler filter banks Salzburg, 29/XI/1803 – Venezia, 17/III/1853

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Types of Radar
• Pulsed Radar
– Transmits pulses with a high power.
– Can detect objects, measures range, but not speeds, and has blind and ambiguous ranges.
• CW radar
– Transmits a low power continuous-wave signal.
– Can detect objects, measures radial velocity from Doppler shift, but cannot measure range.
– Can be designed in a compact and simple circuitry.
• Pulsed Doppler Radar
– If the phase of the electromagnetic wave is measured, the measurement of the target speed is
obtained, but has blind speeds.
– An MTI Radar (Moving Target Indicator) is a kind of pulsed Doppler Radar, which removes the
echoes from the static clutter.
– Increases the hardware complexity on the Pulsed Radar.
• FM-CW radar
– Transmits a low power frequency modulated CW signal.
– Can detect objects, and measures range and radial velocity. Based on [2]

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DOPPLER EFFECT

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Doppler effect in acoustic waves

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Doppler effect in electromagnetic waves
Doppler Shift: A frequency shift that occurs in electromagnetic waves due to
the motion of scatters toward or away from the observer.

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Continuous Wave Radar

CW RADAR

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DOPPLER FREQUENCY SHIFT EFFECT
TX

- The received frequency differs from the transmitted

frequency, due to the Doppler effect of the target.

= · cos Only it is possible the measurement of the

radar-target relative radial velocity
Velocity

Radial velocity – velocity projected onto line-of-sight

Line-of-sight
Monostatic
radar

Doppler radar: A radar that can determine the frequency shift through
measurement of the phase change that occurs in electromagnetic waves during a
series of pulses.
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DOPPLER FREQUENCY SHIFT EFFECT
v

vr

TX

= ; = =
fD= Doppler frequency
4"
= − = −2 =− vr = radial velocity
#$ f0 = transmission frequency
& 4" & 4" λ0 = wavelength
% = =− =− c = propagation velocity (light speed)
& #$ & #$
% 2 2'$
' = =− =−
2" #$ ( 2'$
' =−
(
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HOMODYNE CW RADAR
v

vr

'$

RX f0+fD

cos 2"'$

cos 2" '$ + '

cos 2"'

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HOMODYNE CW RADAR

With a simple receiver, the sign information of the Doppler frequency is lost.
Only the target speed is obtained without any information about the sense of
the target.

Mixer

Removed by filtering

Local Oscillator
There is an ambiguity in target speed, because the
signal components at fc+fD and fc-fD, result in the
same IF.

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HETEREODYNE CW RADAR

• Improves the sensitivity of the receiver.

• Avoids the leakage problems of the circulator.
• But doesn’t detects the sign of the Doppler shift.

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I/Q HOMODYNE CW RADAR (Sign sense)

To solve this ambiguity, the use of a phase/quadrature (I/Q) receiver is

required, where the module and phase information is obtained, but increasing
the complexity of the receiver.
In-phase and quadrature mixers

Mixer (I)
For the negative Doppler:

Mixer (Q) In-phase:

Quadrature:

Change in sign

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 I/Q HETERODYNE CW RADAR (Sign sense)

An other I/Q
implementation
is possible with a
heterodyne
receiver, with a
digital I/Q
processing.

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NORMALIZED FREQUENCIES BY THE CNAF
Cuadro nacional de atribución de frecuencias (CNAF)
CNAF 2013 (B.O.E. de 9 de mayo 2013, actualizado B.O.E. de 16 de abril 2015)
http://www.minetur.gob.es/telecomunicaciones/Espectro/Paginas/CNAF.aspx

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PULSED RADAR WITH DOPPLER SHIFT

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PULSE DOPPLER RADAR
Pulse At the receiver, the phase of the
Modulator
incoming input is compared with the
phase of the transmitted signal.
Duplexer
Directional coupler

Power
Amplifer

Reference A COHERENT receiver is needed

signal

Doppler Target
processor Speed

Low Noise 2nd. detector

IF Matched Video Threshold Target
RF or
Amplifier Filter amplifier decision Range
Amplifier Demodulator

Local Oscillator

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PULSED DOPPLER RADAR
Pulse
Modulator

.( )= . cos 2"'$
Duplexer
Directional coupler

Power
Amplifer

= cos 2"'$ −, Reference

signal

4" $
= cos 2"' −
Doppler Target

#$
processor Speed

Low Noise 2nd. detector

IF Matched Video Threshold Target
RF or
Amplifier Filter amplifier decision Range
Amplifier Demodulator

Local Oscillator

2 2 4"'$ $ 4" $
, = $ ± = cos 2"'$ 1 ∓ − = cos 2" '$ ∓ ' −
( ( ( #$

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PULSE RADAR WITH THE DOPPLER SHIFT EFFECT
4" $ Mixer 4" $
= cos 2" '$ ∓ ' − = cos 2"' −
#$ #$

.( )= . cos 2"'$ Time domain 2

Local Oscillator

' > 132

Frequency
domain
' < 132

fd=0; fd

Waveform of the received RF pulsed signal

with the effects of the Doppler frequency .
Still signal from clutters !!!
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PULSE RADAR WITH THE DOPPLER SHIFT EFFECT
Time domain

Moving targets
Frequency
domain

The fixed clutter echoes

fd=0; fd remain the same from
sweep a sweep.
After integration, only
the moving targets are
Still signal from clutters !!! clearly identified.

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Pulsed Radar with Doppler Shift

MOVING TARGET INDICATOR (MTI)

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MTI RADAR: Block Diagram

MTI is the process of rejecting fixed or slowly

moving clutter while passing echoes from
targets moving at significant velocities.

In most cases the MTI is sensitive only to radial

components of velocity, but area MTI
techniques can provide sensitivity to angular
components as well.

Matched
filter

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MTI WITH SINGLE DELAY-LINE CANCELLER
• Implementation in the
time domain is based on
the fact that the phase
of the fixed target echo
does not change from
pulse to pulse, while
that of the moving
target changes at a rate
corresponding to the
Doppler frequency.

• This leads to the delay-

line canceler
implementation.
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MTI WITH SINGLE DELAY-LINE CANCELLER

5 7 sin 2"' / ,> 0 $ 6

;< 5?@ 27 sin "' ,> cos 2"' ,> $
56 = 7 sin 2"' $ , $ =

C D . E F C D E F
if 56, 5 are I/Q (complex):5 7 ; 56 7
Transfer function of the single canceller |B ' | 2 |sin "' ,> |

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 MTI WITH SINGLE DELAY-LINE CANCELLER

|B ' | 2 | sin "' ,> |

• It removes the ideal static clutter echoes δ(0), but the

Doppler shifts that are multiples of the PRF are
undetectable.
• They are called the blind speeds. When ' = ... -2/Tp, -1/Tp, 0, +1/Tp , +2/Tp, ....

H#$ #$
G = = H PRF; H 1,2,3, …
2,> 2

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MTI

BLIND SPEEDS REDUCTION TECHNIQUES

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MULTIPLE PRF’s
If we use two PRF in a single delay line canceller, we obtain
different blind speeds for each PRF:

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MULTIPLE PRF’s
If we choose PRF1=(2/3)PRF2 , the only simultaneous blind speed occurs when 2PRF2=3PRF1

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MULTIPLE PRF’s: METHODS
The PRF can be changed:
• Scan to scan
• Dwell to dwell. (Dwell: time on the target)
• Pulse to pulse (staggered PRF):
• Usually 4 different PRF’s are used, in a four interval sequence:

P6 Q R6 P Q R PO Q RO P; Q R;

First blind speed with a constant PRF First blind speed as a result of the
as the average of the 4 PRF’s combination of the 4 different PRF’s
#$ ,6 + , + ,O + ,; 6 P6 + P + PO + P;
N =
2
6 N
4 4
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MTI

CLUTTER ANALYSIS

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CLUTTER SPECTRAL DENSITY
Usually, the real clutter has no zero width.
The local oscillator’s drifts, among the slow movements due to the
wind, or to other considerations, provides a low Doppler shift,
which can be described by a Gaussian noise spectral density:

' ' #$ W
S ' = S$ exp − = S$ exp − , in
2 W 8 Y Hz

Where:
W0 : peak value of the clutter power spectral density (W/Hz)
σc : standard deviation of the clutter spectrum (Hz)
σv : standard deviation of the clutter spectrum (m/s)

And both deviations are related through:

'$ 2 Y
W =2 Y =
( #$
Being f0 the transmission frequency (Coho+Stalo)

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MTI WITH SINGLE DELAY-LINE CANCELLER

The static clutter echoes appears at the output of the canceller, and
proportional to the σc.

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MTI

PERFORMANCE EVALUATION

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 CLUTTER ATTENUATION
Defined as the ratio between the Clutter input versus the Clutter output of the canceller:
`
]^G _$ S ' &'
] = = `
]?@ _$ S(') B(') &'

For a single canceller, it becomes:

` '
_$ S$ exp − &'
2 W 0,5 0,5 1
] = ≅ =
' 1 − exp −2" ,> W 1 − 1 − 2" ,> W 4" ,>
_$ S$ exp −
` W
4 abH "' ,> &'
2 W

Q R Q R #$
] ≅
4" W 16" Y

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MTI IMPROVEMENT FACTOR
Defined as the ratio between the Signal to Clutter ratio at the output, versus the Signal to
Clutter ratio at the input of the canceller:
i⁄] ?@ ]^G i?@ i?@
gh = = · =] ·
i⁄] ^G ]?@ i^G i^G

klmn
Since = B ' depends on the radial speed of every target, in practice we compute the
kop
average Signal power gain of the filter
6
i?@ i?@ .s
→ = B ' = ,> r B ' &'
i^G i^G $

For a single canceller, it becomes:

Q R Q R #$
gh = 2 · ] ≅ =
2" W 8" Y

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SUBCLUTTER VISIBILITY (SCV)
• Is defined as the ratio by which the target echo power may be weaker than the coincident clutter echo
power and still be detected with specified detection and false alarm probabilities.

• Target and clutter powers are measured on a single pulse return and all target radial velocities are
assumed equally likely.

i]5 &t = gh &t − (i⁄])?@ (&t)

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CLUTTER VISIBILITY FACTOR (VOC)
• Defined as the predetection signal to clutter ratio (S/C) that provides stated probabilities
of detection and false alarm on a display.

• In moving-target-indicator systems, it is the ratio after cancelation or Doppler filtering.

• The clutter visibility factor is the ratio by which the target signal must exceed the clutter
residue so that target detection can occur without having the clutter residue result in
false-target detections. The system must provide a threshold that the targets will cross
and the clutter residue will not cross.

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MTI

CLUTTER CANCELLATION TECHNIQUES

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MTI RADAR WITH DOUBLE DELAY-LINE CANCELLER

Transfer function of the double canceller |B ' | = 4 sin "' ,>

Improves the
attenuation around the
static clutter.

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MTI RADAR WITH DOUBLE DELAY-LINE CANCELLER

Q R; Q R ; #;$
] ≅
48" ; W; 768" ; Y;

Q R; Q R ; #;$
gh = 6 · ] ≅ ; ; =
8" W 128" ; Y;

And in general, for a n-stage cancellers, the Improvement factor is:

G
2G 1
gh ≅ ·
H! 2" W3
Q R
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OTHER MTI CANCELLERS
Second order canceller:
weights
3 pulses
2 delay lines

n order canceller:

Weights:
H!
w^ = −1 ^ 6
, for i=1, 2, …,n+1
H−b+1 !· b−1 !
N pulses
And with |B ' | = 2G | sinG "' ,> | n delay lines

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OTHER MTI CANCELLERS

Non Recursive Transversal Filter

N pulses
n delay lines

, for i=1, 2, …,n+1,

^ 6 G!
Weights: w^ = −1 and N=n+1
G ^z6 !· ^ 6 !

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DOPPLER FILTER BANKS
Contiguous sets of filters for detecting targets

• Multiple moving targets, can be separated

depending of their Doppler shift.
• If the clutter and the target have different
speeds, they don’t interfere between them.
• The noise power is reduced due to the low
bandwidth of each filter, and provides
coherent integration.
• It can be designed through a transversal
filters with a complex weights (module and
phase).

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DOPPLER FILTER BANKS

Weights:
{
w^,{ = exp 2"(b − 1) , for i = 1, 2, …N; and k = 0, 1, … N-1
|

sin "} ' ,> − 73}

B{ ' =
sin " ' ,> − 73}

Transfer function of the k filter

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“BLIND” PHASES
V1

• If the Doppler frequency produced

by a moving target is sampled at 1/PRF

peak positive and negative values

of the sinewave, the signal at the
output of the single canceller Vout

doesn't experiment any losses.

V2

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“BLIND” PHASES
• But, if the Doppler frequency
produced by a moving target is not 1/PRF

sampled at peak positive and

negative values of the sinewave,
the signal at the output of the
single canceller can experiment
some losses.

• This effect is called BLIND PHASES.

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DIGITAL MTI PROCESSING

• The blind phases can be

minimized by using a
digital MTI processor,
based on an I/Q receiver.

• Due to the fact that

always there is a 90°
phase shift between the I
signal and the Q signal, if
one channel signal
experiments some loss,
the other half of the signal
energy can be recovered
in the other channel.

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PULSED DOPPLER RADAR

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A TRADE OFF BETWEEN AMBIGUITIES

• An airborne surveillance Radar, requires small antennas, but with high gain.
• This can only be achieved, by increasing the transmission frequency, (reducing the
wavelength).
=
• But increasing the frequency, implies lowering the blind speeds, G = H PRF.
• But if we compensate it, increasing the PRF, then the maximum unambiguous range
decreases, ~•€•‚ W⁄ ƒ „
• A trade-off is necessary between the Doppler ambiguities and the Range ambiguities.

Radar type PRF Unambiguous range Blind speeds

MTI Low Higher Lower
High PRF Pulse
High Shorter Higher
Doppler
Medium PRF Pulse
Medium Medium Medium
Doppler

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AWACS: Airborne Warning and Control System
• A mobile, long-range Radar
surveillance and control center for
air defense.
• The system, as developed by the
U.S. Air Force, is mounted in a
specially modified Boeing 707
aircraft.
• Its main radar antenna is mounted
on a turntable housed in a circular
rotodome 9 m (30 feet) in diameter,
elliptical in cross-section, and 1.8 m
deep at its center.
• The radar system can detect, track,
and identify low-flying aircraft at a
distance of 370 km (200 nautical
miles) and high-level targets at
much greater distances.

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AWACS

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Multi-mode Radar: Flexibility to Watch the Skies

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