Sensor calibration errors in compressive distributed-aperture radar sensing

As unmanned platforms become more common, the desire for lightweight, low-power, inexpensive radar systems has increased. One such solution is a distributed-aperture, multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO) radar. This allows simple, lightweight antennas to work cooperatively as a larger array. Typically, this setup requires a large amount of communications bandwidth, reducing its utility. Herein, we explore compressed sensing techniques as a solution. A model was developed to derive performance curves for detection of targets in range-angle-Doppler space. We explored in the impact on performance versus the accuracy to which the locations of the sensors are known and the precision to which they can be time synchronized. Our results show that the compressed sensing process is not brittle to errors of this type.