BAE Systems has developed a baseline real-time selected vehicle (SV) radar tracking capability that successfully tracked multiple civilian vehicles in real-world traffic conditions within challenging semi-urban clutter. This real-time tracking capability was demonstrated in laboratory setting. Recent enhancements to the baseline capability include multiple detection modes, improvements to the system-level design, and a wide-area tracking mode. The multiple detection modes support two tracking regimes; wide-area and localized selected vehicle tracking. These two tracking regimes have distinct challenges that may be suited to different trackers. Incorporation of a wide-area tracking mode provides both situational awareness and the potential for enhancing SV track initiation. Improvements to the system-level design simplify the integration of multiple detection modes and more realistic SV track initiation capabilities. Improvements are designed to contribute to a comprehensive tracking capability that exploits a continuous stare paradigm. In this paper, focus will be on the challenges, design considerations, and integration of selected vehicle tracking.
KEYWORDS: Synthetic aperture radar, Target detection, Radar, Doppler effect, Antennas, Global Positioning System, Digital filtering, Signal to noise ratio, Device simulation, Detection and tracking algorithms
We describe techniques for improving ground moving target indication (GMTI) performance in multi-channel synthetic aperture radar (SAR) systems. Our approach employs a combination of moving reference processing (MRP) to compensate for defocus of moving target SAR responses and space-time adaptive processing (STAP) to mitigate the effects of strong clutter interference. Using simulated moving target and clutter returns, we demonstrate focusing of the target return using MRP, and discuss the effect of MRP on the clutter response. We also describe formation of adaptive degrees of freedom (DOFs) for STAP filtering of MRP processed data. For the simulated moving target in clutter example, we demonstrate improvement in the signal to interference plus noise (SINR) loss compared to more standard algorithm configurations. In addition to MRP and STAP, the use of tracker feedback, false alarm mitigation, and parameter estimation techniques are also described. A change detection approach for reducing false alarms from clutter discretes is outlined, and processing of a measured data coherent processing interval (CPI) from a continuously orbiting platform is described. The results demonstrate detection and geolocation of a high-value target under track. The endoclutter target is not clearly visible in single-channel SAR chips centered on the GMTI track prediction. Detections are compared to truth data before and after geolocation using measured angle of arrival (AOA).
This document describes a challenge problem whose scope is the detection, geolocation, tracking
and ID of moving vehicles from a set of X-band SAR data collected in an urban environment. The
purpose of releasing this Gotcha GMTI Data Set is to provide the community with X-band SAR data
that supports the development of new algorithms for SAR-based GMTI. To focus research onto
specific areas of interest to AFRL, a number of challenge problems are defined.
The data set provided is phase history from an AFRL airborne X-band SAR sensor. Some key
features of this data set are two-pass, three phase center, one-foot range resolution, and one
polarization (HH). In the scene observed, multiple vehicles are driving on roads near buildings.
Ground truth is provided for one of the vehicles.
This paper examines the theory, application, and results of using single-channel synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data with Moving Reference Processing (MRP) to focus and geolocate moving targets. Moving targets within a standard SAR imaging scene are defocused, displaced, or completely missing in the final image. Building on previous research at AFRL, the SAR-MRP method focuses and geolocates moving targets by reprocessing the SAR data to focus the movers rather than the stationary clutter. SAR change detection is used so that target detection and focusing is performed more robustly. In the cases where moving target returns possess the same range versus slow-time histories, a geolocation ambiguity results. This ambiguity can be resolved in a number of ways. This paper concludes by applying the SAR-MRP method to high-frequency radar measurements from persistent continuous-dwell SAR observations of a moving target.
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