Photonic generation of microwave phase coded radar signal

In modern radar systems, the requirements of resolution, sensitivity, and flexibility are pushing the development of reconfigurable and software-defined radio-frequency (RF) signal generators, capable of producing radar pulses with arbitrary amplitude and phase, over high-frequency carriers with the phase stability required by coherent radar applications. In this work we propose a photonic based approach for generating very-high-frequency radar signals with advanced phase coding. The scheme exploits a Mode Locked Laser and an IQ electro-optical Mach Zehnder Modulator. Experimental results obtained around 25GHz relative to Barker and Frank codes are presented and compared with numerical simulations in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed technique. The proposed scheme shows potentials for wideband modulation and could represent a promising solution for the implementation of fully digital radar systems.