Abstract:

The clutter range dependence is a key problem of forward looking radar and bistatic airborne radar. It means that the clutter characteristic statistics change with range variation, which leads to an incorrect estimation of the clutter covariance matrix and results in low performance for space-time adaptive processing (STAP). To deal with this problem, a new method based on space time interpolation is proposed. The method gets two groups of steering vectors from the referenced range and the range under test by using the owned knowledge, then takes subspace fitting theory to interpolate the range clutter to the referenced range clutter, what is more, adds the moving target restriction to avoid target elimination. Computer simulations show the efficiency of the method.