Multiple phase centre DPCA for airborne radar

The performance of airborne displaced phase center antenna (DPCA) systems with two or more receive phase centers is studied. The detection capability of these radar systems is examined in terms of signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) as a function of target radial speed. The results indicate that DPCA can perform better than a single phase center radar (in terms of SIR). For ideal DPCA with optimal processing, an important factor in detecting the slowest possible target is not the number of receive phase centers but the maximum separation between the outermost receive phase centers. Increasing the number of phase centers, however, has an effect on the dim speeds of the system. With the binomial canceller, increasing the number of phase centers enlarges the blind speed nulls and may degrade the performance of DPCA. Internal motion degrades the performance of DPCA. The sensitivity of DPCA to increased number of phase center separation, or increased number of phase centers, in the presence of internal motion is scenario dependent