Long time coherent integration (LTCI) technique enhances radar detection of maneuvering weak targets. Unfortunately, range migration (RM) and Doppler frequency migration (DFM) would occur during the integration period. Existing LTCI methods are all based on the assumption that the target is of single motion model (i.e., the target's motion model is fixed) during the long integration time. However, with increasing target's maneuverability and long observation time (needed to detect weak targets), the target's motion model is often changing (i.e., target is of multiple motion models) during the integration time, which would reduce the performance of existing LTCI methods significantly. In this paper, we address the LTCI problem for detecting a maneuvering weak target with multiple motion models, where the target signal model is first established. Thereafter, the short-time generalized Radon Fourier transform (STGRFT) based LTCI algorithm is proposed. The STGRFT method could not only eliminate RM and DFM, but also estimate the model-changing point (i.e., the time when target's motion model changes) and accumulate the target energy distributed in different motion stages (corresponding to different motion models). Finally, numerical and real-data experiments are carried out to demonstrate its effectiveness. The results confirm that in terms of integration gain, input-output signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) performance and detection ability, STGRFT-based method is superior to the existing popular LTCI algorithms.

The long-time Coherent Integration (CI) is one of the most effective and important techniques to improve radar detection performance for hypersonic weak targets in coherent radar system. Traditional long-time CI algorithms only consider the Range Walk (RW) rather than the scale effect. Actually, with the increase of target's velocity and the time-bandwidth product of the transmitted signal, the scale effect will appear in the echo signal, which influences the performance of Pulse Compression (PC) and the subsequent CI. In order to address the problem of scale effect during the long-time CI for the hypersonic target, a novel CI algorithm, i.e., SCaled Radon Fourier Transform (SCRFT), is proposed in this paper. The SCRFT can realize intra-pulse and inter-pulse integration for hypersonic target with RW and scale effect. Besides, the proposed algorithm can also estimate target's velocity. Compared to the traditional long-time CI algorithms, SCRFT can achieve better detection and velocity estimation performance. Finally, numerical simulations are carefully designed to verify the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

An airborne bistatic radar working in downward-looking mode confronts two major challenges for low-altitude target detection. One is range cell migration (RCM) and Doppler migration (DM) resulting from the relative motion of the radar and target. The other is the non-stationarity characteristic of clutter due to the radar configuration. To solve these problems, this paper proposes a joint implementation method based on sub-aperture processing to achieve clutter suppression and coherent maneuvering target detection. Specifically, clutter Doppler compensation and sliding window processing are carried out to realize sub-aperture space–time processing, removing the clutter non-stationarity resulting from the bistatic geometric configuration. Thus, the output matrix of clutter suppression in the sub-aperture could be obtained. Then, the elements with the same phase of this matrix are superimposed and rearranged to achieve the reconstructed 2-D range-pluse echo matrix. Next, the aperture division with respect to slow time is conducted and the RCM correction based on modified location rotation transform (MLRT) and coherent integration (CI) are realized within each sub-aperture. Finally, the matched filtering process (MFP) is applied to compensate for the RCM/DM among different sub-apertures to coherently integrate the maneuvering target energy of all sub-apertures. The simulation and measured data processing results prove the validity of the proposed method.

The detection of hypersonic targets usually confronts range migration (RM) issue before coherent integration (CI). The traditional methods aiming at correcting RM to obtain CI mainly considers the narrow-band radar condition. However, with the increasing requirement of far-range detection, the time bandwidth product, which is corresponding to radar's mean power, should be promoted in actual application. Thus, the echo signal generates the scale effect (SE) at large time bandwidth product situation, influencing the intra and inter pulse integration performance. To eliminate SE and correct RM, this paper proposes an effective algorithm, i.e., scaled location rotation transform (ScLRT). The ScLRT can remove SE to obtain the matching pulse compression (PC) as well as correct RM to complete CI via the location rotation transform, being implemented by seeking the actual rotation angle. Compared to the traditional coherent detection algorithms, ScLRT can address the SE problem to achieve better detection/estimation capabilities. At last, this paper gives several simulations to assess the viability of ScLRT.