A Doppler Range Compensation for Step-Frequency Continuous-Wave Radar for Detecting Small UAV

Massimiliano Pieraccini; Lapo Miccinesi; Neda Rojhani

doi:10.3390/s19061331

A Doppler Range Compensation for Step-Frequency Continuous-Wave Radar for Detecting Small UAV

Sensors (Basel). 2019 Mar 16;19(6):1331. doi: 10.3390/s19061331.

Authors

Massimiliano Pieraccini¹, Lapo Miccinesi², Neda Rojhani³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Information Engineering, University of Florence, via Santa Marta, 3 50139 Firenze, Italy. massimiliano.pieraccini@unifi.it.
² Department of Information Engineering, University of Florence, via Santa Marta, 3 50139 Firenze, Italy. lapo.miccinesi@unifi.it.
³ Department of Information Engineering, University of Florence, via Santa Marta, 3 50139 Firenze, Italy. neda.rojhani@unifi.it.

Abstract

Step-frequency continuous-wave (SFCW) modulation can have a role in the detection of small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) at short range (less than 1⁻2 km). In this paper, the theory of SFCW range detection is reviewed, and a specific method for correcting the possible range shift due to the Doppler effect is devised. The proposed method was tested in a controlled experimental set-up, where a free-falling target (i.e., a corner reflector) was correctly detected by an SFCW radar. This method was finally applied in field for short-range detection of a small UAV.

Keywords: Doppler; UAV detection; continuous wave; radar.