Transient waveform synthesis for radar target discrimination

A new scheme for radar detection and discrimination, the transient waveform synthesis method, is investigated. This scheme consists of synthesizing an aspect-independent waveform for the incident radar signal which excites the target in such a way that the return radar signal from the target contains only a single resonance mode of that target in the late-time period. When the incident waveform synthesized to excite a particular natural mode of a known preselected target is applied to a different target, the return signal will be significantly different from that of the expected natural mode. The wrong target can thus be discriminated. Three kinds of targets, a normally oriented infinite cylinder, a pair of skew-coupled wires and a system of crossed wires are investigated. Both integral-equation and differential-equation approaches are used to search for the natural resonance modes of the targets. Impulse responses are then computed using these natural modes and the singularity expansion method (SEM).