A Waveform Model for Bistatic Radar With Arbitrary Long Coherent Processing Interval

Paper i proceeding, 2025

A model for bistatic radar waveforms with an arbitrary long coherent processing interval (CPI) is presented. The model describes the received waveform in the time domain accounting for the varying propagation delay due to the bistatic range variation during the CPI. The model represents the received waveform, accounting for relative constant velocity motion between radar platforms and target. Traditional methods often simplify this effect, leading to performance losses that can become severe for long CPI. The proposed model supports arbitrary transmitted waveforms including continuous wave (CW) operation, long CPIs, and varying positions and velocities of the transmitter, receiver, and target. It also extends to multichannel receivers. The developed model can readily be used in simulations to quantify the performance loss when evaluating suboptimal detectors based on simplifying model assumption. Simulations demonstrate the use of the model to highlight the impact of target velocity and CPI length on the performance when using the classical approximate Kronecker structure (space, fast-time, slow-time) processing model. The introduced model pave the way for future research on developing fast and accurate processing schemes for different multichannel radar systems utilising long CPI.