Maritime Moving Target Detection with BeiDou-based Passive Radar

Abstract

This paper presents a maritime moving target detection technique for passive radar with BeiDou satellite as transmitter of opportunity. Due to the restricted power budget provided by BeiDou satellite, to detect the target, the echo over a long time needs to be collected and integrated. In this paper, first, a range cell migration (RCM) correction technique called range-symmetry transform (RST) is applied, gathering the echo energy into a same range. Then, the dechirp processing is performed to the extracted azimuth signal, after which the dechirped signal is segmented into multiple frames. Finally, a coherent integration inside each frame is accomplished by means of the Fourier transform, followed by a non-coherent integration of multiple frames. The target echo is well concentrated in the final integration result, providing the capability of target detection. The effectiveness of the proposed maritime moving target detection technique is verified by simulations.