Joint communication and radar sensing (JCAS) integrates communication and radar/radio sensing into one system, sharing one transmitted signal. In this paper, we investigate JCAS waveform optimization underlying communication signals, where a base station detects radar targets and communicates with mobile users simultaneously. We first develop individual novel waveform optimization problems for communications and sensing, respectively. For communications, we propose a novel lower bound of sum rate by integrating multi-user interference and effective channel gain into one metric that simplifies the optimization of the sum rate. For radar sensing, we consider optimizing one of two metrics, the mutual information or the Cramer-Rao bound. Then, we formulate the JCAS problem by optimizing the communication metric under different constraints of the radar metric, and we obtain both closed-form solutions and iterative solutions to the non-convex JCAS optimization problem. Numerical results are provided and verify the proposed optimization solutions.
The problem of data-driven joint design of transmitted waveform and detector in a radar system is addressed in this paper. We propose two novel learning-based approaches to waveform and detector design based on end-to-end training of the radar system. The first approach consists of alternating supervised training of the detector for a fixed waveform and reinforcement learning of the transmitter for a fixed detector. In the second approach, the transmitter and detector are trained simultaneously. Various operational waveform constraints, such as peak-to-average-power ratio (PAR) and spectral co…
Automotive radar is a key component in an ADAS. The increasing number of radars implemented in vehicles makes interference between them a noteworthy issue. One method of interference mitigation is to limit the TBP of radar waveforms. However, the problems of how much TBP is necessary and how to optimally utilize the limited TBP have not been addressed. We take CWS as an example and propose a method of designing the radar waveform parameters oriented by the performance of CWS We propose a metric to quantify the CWS performance and study how the radar waveform parameters (bandwidth and duration)…
Range profiling refers to the measurement of target response along the radar slant range. It plays an important role in automatic target recognition. In this paper, we consider the design of transmit waveform to improve the range profiling performance of radar systems. Two design metrics are adopted for the waveform optimization problem: one is to maximize the mutual information between the received signal and the target impulse response (TIR); the other is to minimize the minimum mean-square error for estimating the TIR. In addition, practical constraints on the waveforms are considered, incl…
An important problem in cognitive radar is to enhance the estimation performance of the system by a joint design of its probing signal and receive filter using the a priori information on interference. In such cases, the knowledge of interference statistics (particularly the covariance) plays a vital role in an effective design of the radar waveforms. In most practical scenarios, however, the received signal and interference statistics are available subject to some uncertainty. An extreme manifestation of this practical observation occurs for radars employing one-bit receivers, where only a no…
This paper addresses robust waveform design for multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) radar detection. A probabilistic model is proposed to describe the target uncertainty. Considering that waveform design based on maximizing the probability of detection is intractable, the relative entropy between the distributions of the observations under two hypotheses (viz., the target is present/absent) is employed as the design metric. To tackle the resulting non-convex optimization problem, an efficient algorithm based on minorization-maximization (MM) is derived. Numerical results demonstrate that the…
An end-to-end learning approach is proposed for the joint design of transmitted waveform and detector in a radar system. Detector and transmitted waveform are trained alternately: For a fixed transmitted waveform, the detector is trained using supervised learning so as to approximate the Neyman-Pearson detector; and for a fixed detector, the transmitted waveform is trained using reinforcement learning based on feedback from the receiver. No prior knowledge is assumed about the target and clutter models. Both transmitter and receiver are implemented as feedforward neural networks. Numerical res…
An integrated radar and communications system (IRCS) where a monostatic radar transceiver is employed for target classification while simultaneously used as a communications transmitter is considered. The radar combined propagation-target response (joint response of the radar propagation channel and target) and communications channel response are generally frequency selective but the corresponding frequency response functions are not exactly known. In particular, these frequency response functions are only known to lie in an uncertainty class. To ensure the IRCS simultaneously provides accepta…
In this paper, we propose a novel waveform design for multi-input multi-output (MIMO) dual-functional radar-communication systems by taking the range sidelobe control into consideration. In particular, we focus on optimizing the weighted summation of communication and radar metrics under per-antenna power budget. While the formulated optimization problem is non-convex, we develop a first-order descent algorithm by exploiting the manifold structure of its feasible region, which finds a near-optimal solution within a low computational overhead. Numerical results show that the proposed waveform d…
In this paper, we focus on constant-modulus waveform design for the dual use of radar target detection and cellular transmission. As the MIMO radar typically transmits orthogonal waveforms to search potential targets, we aim at jointly minimizing the downlink multi-user interference and the non-orthogonality of the transmitted waveform. Given the non-convexity in both orthogonal and CM constraints, we decompose the formulated optimization problem as two sub-problems, where we solve one of the sub-problems by singular value decomposition and the other one by the Riemannian conjugate gradient al…
In this letter, we focus on designing constant-modulus waveform with discrete phases for the multi-input multi-output (MIMO) radar, where the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) is maximized in the presence of both the signal-dependent clutter and the noise. Given the NP-hardness of the formulated problem, we propose to relax the original optimization as a sequence of continuous quadratic programming (QP) subproblems by use of the convex hull of the discrete feasible region, which yields approximated solutions with much lower computational costs. Finally, we assess the effectiveness…
We present a novel approach to the problem of dual-functional radar and communication (DFRC) waveform design with adjustable peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR), while minimizing the multi-user communication interference and maintaining a similarity constraint towards a radar chirp signal. The approach is applicable to generic radar chirp signals and for different constellation sizes. We formulate the waveform design problem as a non convex optimization problem. As a solution, we adopt the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM), hence iterating towards a stable waveform for both rad…
In this study, a novel transmission scheme is proposed to serve radar-sensing and communication objectives at the same time and allocated bandwidth. The proposed transmitted frame non-orthogonally superimposes two different waveforms, which are frequency modulated continuous-wave (FMCW) for radar-sensing and orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) for communication. Also, the receiver scheme that performs channel estimation via radar-sensing functionality without degrading data rate of communication operation is introduced. As numerically evaluated, the proposed system achieves good …
This paper aims to design a set of transmitting waveforms in cognitive colocated Multi-Input Multi-Output (MIMO) radar systems considering the simultaneous minimization of spatial- and the range- Integrated Sidelobe Level Ratio (ISLR). The design problem is formulated as a bi-objective Pareto optimization under practical constraints on the waveforms, namely total transmit power, peak-to-average-power ratio (PAR), constant modulus, and discrete phase alphabet. A Coordinate Descent (CD) based approach is proposed, in which at every single variable update of the algorithm we obtain the solution o…
Conventional sensing applications rely on electromagnetic far-field channel models with plane wave propagation. However, recent ultra-short-range automotive radar applications at upper millimeter-wave or low terahertz (THz) frequencies envisage operation in the near-field region, where the wavefront is spherical. Unlike far-field, the near-field beampattern is dependent on both range and angle, thus requiring a different approach to waveform design. For the first time in the literature, we adopt the beampattern matching approach to design unimodular waveforms for THz automotive radars with low…
In this letter, we consider the multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) radar waveform design in the presence of signal-dependent clutters and additive white Gaussian noise. By imposing the constant modulus constraint (CMC) and waveform similarity constraint (SC), the signal-to-interference-plus-noise (SINR) maximization problem is non-convex and NP-hard in general, which can be transformed into a sequence of convex quadratically constrained quadratic programming (QCQP) subproblems. Aiming at solving each subproblem efficiently, we propose a low-complexity method termed Accelerated Gradient Proj…
Frequency-hopping (FH) MIMO radar-based dual-function radar communication (FH-MIMO DFRC) enables communication symbol rate to exceed radar pulse repetition frequency, which requires accurate estimations of timing offset and channel parameters. The estimations, however, are challenging due to unknown, fast-changing hopping frequencies and the multiplicative coupling between timing offset and channel parameters. In this paper, we develop accurate methods for a single-antenna communication receiver to estimate timing offset and channel for FH-MIMO DFRC. First, we design a novel FH-MIMO radar wave…
Controlling the radar beam-pattern by optimizing the transmit covariance matrix is a well-established approach for performance enhancement in multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) radars. In this paper, we investigate the joint optimization of the waveform covariance matrix and the antenna position vector for a MIMO radar system to approximate a given transmit beam-pattern, as well as to minimize the cross-correlation between the probing signals at a number of given target locations. We formulate this design task as a non-convex optimization problem and then propose a cyclic optimization appro…
We investigate the constant-modulus (CM) waveform design for dual-function radar communication systems in the presence of clutter.To minimize the interference power and enhance the target acquisition performance, we use the signal-to-interference-plus-noise-ratio as the design metric.In addition, to ensure the quality of the service for each communication user, we enforce a constraint on the synthesis error of every communication signals.An iterative algorithm, which is based on cyclic optimization, Dinkinbach's transform, and alternating direction of method of multipliers, is proposed to tack…
The mutual interference between similar radar systems can result in reduced radar sensitivity and increased false alarm rates. To address the synchronous and asynchronous interference mitigation problems in similar radar systems, we first propose herein two slow-time coding schemes to modulate the pulses within a coherent processing interval (CPI) for a single-input-single-output (SISO) scenario. Specifically, the first coding scheme relies on Doppler shifting and the second one is devised based on an optimization approach. We further extend our discussion to the more general case of multiple-…
Joint radar receive filter and waveform design is non-convex, but is individually convex for a fixed receiver filter while optimizing the waveform, and vice versa. Such classes of problems are fre- quently encountered in optimization, and are referred to biconvex programs. Alternating minimization (AM) is perhaps the most popu- lar, effective, and simplest algorithm that can deal with bi-convexity. In this paper we consider new perspectives on this problem via older, well established problems in the optimization literature. It is shown here specifically that the radar waveform optimization may…
We consider a bistatic configuration with a stationary transmitter transmitting unknown waveforms of opportunity and a moving receiver, and present a Deep Learning (DL) framework for passive synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging. Existing passive radar methods require two or more antennas which are either spatially separated or colocated with sufficient directivity to estimate the underlying waveform prior to imaging. Our approach to passive radar only requires a single receiver, hence reduces cost and increases versatility. We approach DL from an optimization perspective and formulate image …
Although routinely utilized in literature, orthogonal waveforms may lose orthogonality in distributed multi-input multi-output (MIMO) radar with spatially separated transmit (TX) and receive (RX) antennas, as the waveforms may experience distinct delays and Doppler frequency offsets unique to different TX-RX propagation paths. In such cases, the output of each waveform-specific matched filter (MF), employed to unravel the waveforms at the RXs, contains both an \auto term and multiple cross terms, i.e., the filtered response of the desired and, respectively, undesired waveforms. We consider the…
In conventional radar, the transmission of the same waveform is repeated after a predefined interval of time called pulse-repetition-interval (PRI). This technique helps to estimate the range and Doppler shift of targets and suppress clutter. In dual-function radar communication (DFRC), different waveforms are transmitted after each PRI. Thus, each waveform yields different range-side-lobe (RSL) levels at the receiver's output. As a consequence, Doppler shift estimation and clutter suppression become challenging tasks. A state-of-the-art (SOTA) method claims that if the number of waveforms is …
We consider a hybrid active-passive radar system that employs a wireless source as a passive illuminator of opportunity (IO) and a co-channel active radar transmitter operating in the same frequency band to seek spectral efficiency. The hybrid system can take advantage of the strengths of passive radar (e.g., energy efficiency, bi-/multi-static configuration, and spatial diversity) as well as those of active radar (dedicated transmitter, flexible transmit beam steering, waveform optimized for sensing, etc.). To mitigate the mutual interference and location-induced timing uncertainty between th…
A novel monostatic multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) dual-function radar communication (DFRC) system is proposed, that uses the available bandwidth efficiently for both sensing and communication. The proposed system, referred to as Shared-Subcarriers DFRC (SS-DFRC) transmits wideband, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) waveforms and allows the transmit antennas to use subcarriers in a shared fashion. A novel, low complexity target estimation approach is proposed to overcome the coupling of radar target parameters and transmitted symbols that arises in that case. When all sub…
This paper describes important considerations and challenges associated with online reinforcement-learning based waveform selection for target identification in frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) automotive radar systems. We present a novel learning approach based on satisficing Thompson sampling, which quickly identifies a waveform expected to yield satisfactory classification performance. We demonstrate through measurement-level simulations that effective waveform selection strategies can be quickly learned, even in cases where the radar must select from a large catalog of candidate …
Mobile radar networks, such as autonomous driving systems, are subject to the severe challenge of mutual interference. Despite the inborn interference-proof capability in frequency modulation continuous waveform (FMCW) radar, interference management is necessary for dense radar networks. The approaches combatting the radar interference include the timing diversity of waveform parameters, data-driven detection interference, and signal processing based decoupling of interference. Moreover, the leverage of radar interference for inferring the information of interfere is studied. Simulations are c…
This paper describes some key ideas and applications of cognitive radars, highlighting the limits and the path forward. Cognitive radars are systems based on the perception-action cycle of cognition that sense the environment, learn from it relevant information about the target and the background, then adapt the radar sensor to optimally satisfy the needs of their mission according to a desired goal. The concept of cognitive radar was introduced originally for active radar only. In this paper we describe how this paradigm can be applied also to passive radar. In particular, we describe (i) cog…
In this paper, we explore a dual-functional radar-communication (DFRC) system for achieving integrated sensing and communications (ISAC). The technique of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is leveraged to overcome the frequency-selective fading of the wideband multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems with one multi-antenna DFRC base station (BS) and multiple single-antenna user equipment (UEs). In order to restrain the high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) of OFDM signals, we aim to jointly design low-PAPR DFRC MIMO-OFDM waveforms. This is done by utilizing a weighted ob…
This paper studies the processing principles, implementation challenges, and performance of OFDM-based radars, with particular focus on the fourth-generation Long-Term Evolution (LTE) and fifth-generation (5G) New Radio (NR) mobile networks' base stations and their utilization for radar/sensing purposes. First, we address the problem stemming from the unused subcarriers within the LTE and NR transmit signal passbands, and their impact on frequency-domain radar processing. Particularly, we formulate and adopt a computationally efficient interpolation approach to mitigate the effects of such emp…
A cognitive beamforming algorithm for colocated MIMO radars, based on Reinforcement Learning (RL) framework, is proposed. We analyse an RL-based optimization protocol that allows the MIMO radar, i.e. the \textit{agent}, to iteratively sense the unknown environment, i.e. the radar scene involving an unknown number of targets at unknown angular positions, and consequently, to synthesize a set of transmitted waveforms whose related beam patter is tailored on the acquired knowledge. The performance of the proposed RL-based beamforming algorithm is assessed through numerical simulations in terms of…
In this paper, we describe the evolution of a pair of polyphase coded waveform for use in second trip suppression in weather radar. The polyphase codes were designed and tested on NASA weather radar. The NASA dual-frequency, dual-polarization Doppler radar (D3R) was developed primarily as a ground validation tool for the GPM satellite dual-frequency radar. Recently, the D3R radar was upgraded with new versions of digital receiver hardware and firmware, which supports larger filter lengths and multiple phase coded waveforms, and also newer IF sub-systems. This has enhanced the capabilities of r…
The existence of multipath brings extra "looks" of targets. This paper considers the extended target detection problem with a narrow band Multiple-Input Multiple-Output(MIMO) radar in the presence of multipath from the view of waveform-filter design. The goal is to maximize the worst-case Signal-to-Interference-pulse-Noise Ratio(SINR) at the receiver against the uncertainties of the target and multipath reflection coefficients. Moreover, a Constant Modulus Constraint(CMC) is imposed on the transmit waveform to meet the actual demands of radar. Two types of uncertainty sets are taken into consi…
Integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) is a promising technology to fully utilize the precious spectrum and hardware in wireless systems, which has attracted significant attentions recently. This paper studies ISAC for the important and challenging monostatic setup, where one single ISAC node wishes to simultaneously sense a radar target while communicating with a communication receiver. Different from most existing schemes that rely on either radar-centric half-duplex (HD) pulsed transmission with information embedding that suffers from extremely low communication rate, or communication-…
Designing unimodular waveforms with a desired beampattern, spectral occupancy and orthogonality level is of vital importance in the next generation Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) radar systems. Motivated by this fact, in this paper, we propose a framework for shaping the beampattern in MIMO radar systems under the constraints simultaneously ensuring unimodularity, desired spectral occupancy and orthogonality of the designed waveform. In this manner, the proposed framework is the most comprehensive approach for MIMO radar waveform design focusing on beampattern shaping. The problem formu…
Concealing objects from interrogation has been a primary objective since the integration of radars into surveillance systems. Metamaterial-based invisibility cloaking, which was considered a promising solution, did not yet succeed in delivering reliable performance against real radar systems, mainly due to its narrow operational bandwidth. Here we propose an approach, which addresses the issue from a signal-processing standpoint and, as a result, is capable of coping with the vast majority of unclassified radar systems by exploiting vulnerabilities in their design. In particular, we demonstrat…
The effects of target motion on the distortion of radar signals are investigated using five transformations, namely, Hsu, Lorentz, Galilean, Reference, and Classical transformation equations. Hsu transformation is used as a primary transformation since it expresses the temporal and spatial transformations between an inertial reference frame and accelerating frame where the origin of the accelerating frame has an initial velocity and acceleration with respect to the inertial frame. Additionally, as the acceleration approach zero and infinity, respectively, the Lorentz and Galilean transformatio…
This paper studies the Two-Person Zero Sum(TPZS) game between a Multiple-Input Multiple-Output(MIMO) radar and an extended target with payoff function being the output Signal-to-Interference-pulse-Noise Ratio(SINR) at the radar receiver. The radar player wants to maximize SINR by adjusting its transmit waveform and receive filter. Conversely, the target player wants to minimize SINR by changing its Target Impulse Response(TIR) from a scaled sphere centered around a certain TIR. The interaction between them forms a Stackelberg game where the radar player acts as a leader. The Stackelberg equili…
Dual-function radar-communication (DFRC), which can simultaneously perform both radar and communication functionalities using the same hardware platform, spectral resource and transmit waveform, is a promising technique for realizing integrated sensing and communication (ISAC). Spacetime adaptive processing (STAP) in multi-antenna radar systems is the primary tool for detecting moving targets in the presence of strong clutter. The idea of joint spatial-temporal optimization in STAP-based radar systems is consistent with the concept of symbol-level precoding (SLP) for multi-input multi-output (…
We consider the design of polyphase waveforms for ground moving target detection with airborne multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) radar. Due to the constant-modulus and finite-alphabet constraint on the waveforms, the associated design problem is non-convex and in general NP-hard. To tackle this problem, we develop an efficient algorithm based on relaxation and cyclic optimization. Moreover, we exploit a reparameterization trick to avoid the significant computational burden and memory requirement brought about by relaxation. We prove that the objective values during the iterations are guara…
Multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) radars transmit a set of sequences that exhibit small cross-correlation sidelobes, to enhance sensing performance by separating them at the matched filter outputs. The waveforms also require small auto-correlation sidelobes to avoid masking of weak targets by the range sidelobes of strong targets and to mitigate deleterious effects of distributed clutter. In light of these requirements, in this paper, we design a set of phase-only (constant modulus) sequences that exhibit near-optimal properties in terms of Peak Sidelobe Level (PSL) and Integrated Sidelobe…
Recent years have witnessed growing interest in reduced cost radar systems operating with low power. Multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) radar technology is known to achieve high performance sensing by probing with multiple orthogonal waveforms. However, implementing a low cost low power MIMO radar is challenging. One of the reasons for this difficulty stems from the increased cost and power consumption required by analog-to-digital convertors (ADCs) in acquiring the multiple waveforms at the radar receiver. In this work we study reduced cost MIMO radar receivers restricted to operate with l…
In radar systems, unimodular (or constant-modulus) waveform design plays an important role in achieving better clutter/interference rejection, as well as a more accurate estimation of the target parameters. The design of such sequences has been studied widely in the last few decades, with most design algorithms requiring sophisticated a priori knowledge of environmental parameters which may be difficult to obtain in real-time scenarios. In this paper, we propose a novel hybrid model-driven and data-driven architecture that adapts to the ever changing environment and allows for adaptive unimodu…
In this paper, we focus on the design of the transmit waveforms of a frequency diverse array (FDA) in order to improve the output signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) in the presence of signal-dependent mainlobe interference. Since the classical multi-carrier matched filtering-based FDA receiver cannot effectively utilize the waveform diversity of FDA, a novel FDA receiver framework based on multi-channel mixing and low-pass filtering is developed to keep the separation of the transmit waveform at the receiver side, while preserving the FDA range-controllable degrees of freedom. Furt…
