Full Phased MIMO Radar with Colocated Antennas

Abstract

A Phased Multi-Input Multi-Output (PMIMO) radar employs a transmit array of antennas that are divided into overlapping subarrays with same number of elements in order to exploit the main advantage of a phased array (coherent gain) and that of MIMO (waveform diversity). This paper proposes Full Phased MIMO (FPMIMO) approach in which both transmit and receive arrays are divided into overlapping subarrays with same number of elements. In this structure various waveform combinations can be adopted simultaneously on both transmit and receive sides, including coherent waveforms, non-coherent subarray waveforms and non-coherent waveforms in order to increase coherent gain, waveform diversity as well as radar system flexibility to adapt to given requirements at any time. The increase in coherent gain and waveform diversity makes radar performance more robust against noises and interferences for the desired target. Radar performance in terms of transmit-receive gain, SINR (Signal-to-Interference-plus-Noise-Power Ratio), and maximum range has been formulated and its effectiveness has been compared to Phased Array (PA), MIMO, and PMIMO radars. FPMIMO radar promises flexibility in adapting itself to condition of the targets as exemplified by the design of bird radar with its mission requirements using the FPMIMO approach. The impact of the use of cos(θ)-type elements is also presented.