Detection Technique of the Targets Buried in Blind Doppler Zone

Based on Multi -AEW Radar Data Fusion

Ying Fu* , Ziyue Tang* , Yongjian Sun*
,
**, Lixiao Zhan*
*Airforce Radar Academy, Wuhan,430019,China
**Beijing Institute of Radio Measurement, Beijing, 100039,China
Email:fy922818@126.com
Abstract
Based on deliberate analysis of the detection problem
concerning the target buried in blind Doppler zone of AEW
radar, a target detection system is conceived founding on
multi-AEW radar data fusion. The fusion rule as well as the
generalized likelihood ratio and the false alarm threshold of
local radar sensors are derived. Simulation results
demonstrate that the advanced technique can improve the
probability of target detection and the quality of target track
dramatically in case the necessary condition is satisfied.
Keywords: Data fusion, Blind Doppler zone, distributed
detection
1. Introduction
In air surveillance mode of AEW radar, a track derived
from one target may be splitted into several incontinuous
track because target plots are temporal vanished and tracks
are reduplicative initialized. Undoubtedly, this phenomenon
results in the decline of the radar intelligence quality. There
are mainly two reasons that should be responsible for the
phenomenon. On one hand, the received signal amplitude
does not exceed the threshold because of a sudden decline of
the Signal to Noise Ratio(SNR). The reasons that result in the
SNR declining generally contains the variation of target's
RCS, the eclipsing of main clutter as well as the blocking of
airfoil in course of swerving. On the other, the Doppler shift
of target echo falls into the blind Doppler zone. The problem
of blind Doppler zone existence is inherent and inevitable[1].
Because AEW radar which adopted the PD technique is
influenced by the clutter absent section and the suppression of
ground moving target, a technique of setting Doppler
threshold
T
f is adopted generally in AEW radar. It leads to
the formation of a blind Doppler zone of target detection
which can be denoted as
{ }
[ , ]
dt dt T T
f f f f O = e .
Therefore, the targets buried in the blind Doppler zone will be
suppressed in company with the clutter and the ground
moving targets with low radial speed.
This paper focuses on the detection problem of target
buried in the blind Doppler zone under the condition of
adequate SNR. The Doppler shift of the target changes with
the variety of its position relative to radar. The diversity of the
Doppler shift relative to different radar is great at the same
time. Thereby the technique founding on multi-AEW radar
data fusion is advanced to detect the targets buried in the
blind Doppler zone. It is proved by the simulation results that
the proposed method can improve the probability of detection
of the targets in blind Doppler zone and possess the extensive
foreground of application.
2. Fundamentals and statement of the problem
Because of the rapid motion of the radar with its
platform, some stationary targets, such as the ground and the
sea, are sure to generate Doppler shift, which is given by
2
cos cos
2
cos
a
dc
a
V
f
V
u

=
=
(1)
And the Doppler shift of moving targets relative to the
AEW radar is expressed as
( ) 2 cos cos
a t
d
V V
f
|

+
=
(2)
Where
a
V and
t
V are the flying speed of AEW and
target respectively. is the angle between the course of
AEW and the line of sight of radar. | is the angle of the
course of target and the line of sight of radar. u and are the
azimuth angle and the elevation angle of the AEW radar
beam respectively. H denotes the altitude of the platform. R
is the slant range from the platform to a clutter patch.
For the convenience of the statement about the problem,
it might as well be supposed that one AEW radar detects one
target which is flying at constant speed. The scenario is given
in Figure 1.
0 0.5 1 1.5 2
x 10
5
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
x 10
5
X direction/m
Y

d
i
r
e
c
t
i
o
n
/
m
AEW
T
a
r
g
e
t

Figure 1. The simulation scenario of

single radar target detection
In which the arrowheads point the courses of the AEW
radar and the target respectively. The markers + denote the
plots of the AEW corresponding to the target. The system
parameters of the AEW radar and the target are given in
Table 1and Table 2 respectively. The Doppler shift history of
the target relative to the AEW radar and the detection results
of the radar are given in Figure 2 and Figure 3 respectively.
Compared Figure 2 to Figure 3, it can be learned that the
radar will lose the target plots continuously if
d dc
f f eO.

___________________________________
978-1-4244-8443-0/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE

Table 1.The system parameters of AEW radar
Parameters of AEW radar value
Speed of AEW radar 140m/s
Carrier frequency 1.3GHz
Pulse duration V
Bandwidth 1MHz
Pulse repetition frequency 2435Hz
Doppler threshold 100Hz
Table 2. The parameters of target
parameters of target value
Speed of target 500m/s
Radar cross section 0.1m
2
0 20 40 60 80
-4000
-3000
-2000
-1000
0
1000
2000
3000
Bl i nd
doppl er
zone
Sample number
D
o
p
p
l
e
r

f
r
e
q
u
e
n
c
y
/
H
z
Figure 2. The Doppler history of target
relative to single radar
-1 0 1 2 3
x 10
5
-3
-2
-1
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
5
T
a
r
g
e
t

X direction /m
Y

d
i
r
e
c
t
i
o
n

/
m
Detected points
undetected points
Figure 3. The result of single radar detection
3. Principles of target detection based on multi-AEW data
fusion
3.1 Network Structure of the detection system
The target detection structure based on multi-AEW data
fusion can be classified as two kinds of centralized and fully
distributed. In the former structure, observations of the local
sensors are directly transmitted to the data fusion centre.
Though it can acquire well detection performance, it is highly
constrained by the capacity and error of the channels between
the local sensors and the data fusion centre and aggravates the
computation load of the data fusion centre.
Therefore, the distributed system is applicable when all
sensors are located at the same site, or the capacity of the
channels between the sensors and the data fusion centre
allows practically error-free transmittal of the sensor
observations to the central processing site.
In the latter system, each local sensor makes local
decisions and then transmits them to the data fusion centre.
Compared with the centralized system, it decreases the traffic
of the channels. But the system performance worsens because
the transmittal of the local observations is not allowed and
partial decisions are made at each local site. Despite the
declining performance of the fully distributed system to a
degree, it possesses some advantages, such as lesser traffic,
better reliability and lower cost. Accordingly, in this paper the
fully distributed system is introduced in Figure 4.

Local Sensor1
Local Sensor2
Local SensorN
Data
Fusion
Center
(DFC)
1
z
2
z
N
z
1
u
2
u
N
u
0
u
Communication
Channels
Target
Figure 4 .Fully distributed target detection system
3.2. Principles of target detection
In Figure 4, it is supposed that the fully distributed
system is consisted by the data fusion centre and N AEW
radars. The binary hypotheses problem is described as
0
: H Target is inexistent
1
: H Target is existent
Each radar of the system makes its decision
{ }( ) 1, 2, ,
i
u i N = = u "
dependently according its observation
i
z
( ) 1, 2, , i N = " and threshold
k
q , where
1 0
1 0
1 ( ) ( )
0 ( ) ( )
i k i
i
i k i
if P z H P z H
u
if P z H P z H
q
q
>

<

(3)
The vector u is transmitted to data fusion centre and
composes the observation vector of the centre. A global
decision
0
u is then obtained at fusion centre based on the
decision vector uand the threshold
0
q . where
1 0 0
0
1 0 0
1 ( ) ( )
0 ( ) ( )
i i
i i
if P u H P u H
u
if P u H P u H
q
q
>

<

(4)
It is proved in [2] that the optimal performance of
CFAR detection will be achieved in local sensors and fusion
centre under Neyman-Pearson criterion. If the global false
alarm rate of the system is given, the fully distributed data
fusion system can be depicted as the following compound
function
( ) { } ( )
0 0 0
: 0,1 ,
N
T T R u T = u
(5)
where
0
T is the fusion function of the fusion centre,
{ }
1
N
i
i
T T
=
= denotes the local decision function variety.
{ } ( ) : 0,1 ,
N
i i i i
T R u T z =
(6)
only when the system probability of false alarm
0 f
P o s , the system probability of detection
0 d
P can be
maximized.
It is of great importance to choose a appropriate
threshold
0
T . In [3], an adaptive distributed fusion algorithm
under Neyman-Pearson criterion is given, which needs
training to obtain convergence. However, both the time that a
target moves across a resolving cell and the quantity that a
radar samples are limit. And the emergence of a target is
occasional, so it is difficult to satisfy the convergence demand
of the mentioned algorithm.

Figure 2 shows that the Doppler shift of the target

changes with the variety of its position relative to radar. The
diversity of the Doppler shift relative to different radar is
great. Therefore, it is rational to take "1 out of N " as the
fusion rule.
It is assumed that the decision made by each radar is
independent and
1 2 N
q q q q = = = = " . In other words,
there is the same
( )
,
d f
P P
at each local sensor. In [4], it is
proved that the optimal system performance is achieved under
the former assumption. In [5], the false alarm rate and the
probability of detection are calculated respectively as follows :
( )
0
1
1
N
N i
i
f f f
i
N
P P P
i

=
| |
=
|
\ .
_
(7)
( )
0
1
1
N
N i
i
d d d
i
N
P P P
i

=
| |
=
|
\ .
_
(8)
where
( )
!
! !
N
N
i i N i
| |
=
|

\ .
(9)
If let
0 f
P o =
, the local detection threshold q can
figure out accordingly.
3.3. Generalized likelihood ratio detection of local radar
sensor
It is supposed that each AEW radar antenna array
consists of M cells, the pulse number between a Coherence
Processing Interval(CPI) is K . The receiving data of the
th
n
cell and the
th
k snapshot is defined as
nk
z . The array data
vector of the
th
k pulse is given by
( )
1 2
T
s k k Mk
Z k z z z ( =

"
(10)
( )
s
Z k ( ) 1, 2, k K = " can be organized as the
following 1 MK dimension column vector
( ) ( ) ( ) 1 2
T
T T T
s s s
Z Z Z Z K ( =

"
(11)
Under the binary hypothesis, Z is given as
1
0
S C N,
C N,
b H
Z
H
+ +
=

(12)
where b is the amplitude of target echo, Cand N are
the clutter and noise vector respectively, S is the target
space-time steering vector.
( ) ( )
t s
S S S
t s
=
(13)
( ) ( ) ( )
( ) ( ) ( )
s
S 1 exp ,
exp 1 ,
s s
T
s
j
j M
u
u
=

"
(14)
( ) ( ) ( )
( ) ( ) ( )
t
S 1 exp ,
exp 1 ,
t t
T
t
j
j K
u
u
=

"
(15)
where denotes the Kronecker product.
( )
2
, cos cos
s
d t
u u

=
( )
4
, cos cos
a
t
d
V
f
t
u u

=
( )
s
< and ( )
t
< is the spatial steering vector and the
temporal (Doppler) steering vector for a signal.
Considering an adaptive fully space-time filter structure
and the input vector Z , the signal-only filter output is given
as
H
y W Z =
(16)
where W is the weight vector.
The generalized likelihood ratio in adaptive space-time
processing advanced in [6] is
1
2
1
1 1
0
S
1
S S 1
H
Z
GLRT
H H
Z Z
H
R Z
R Z R Z
L
H
q

>
A =
< (
+
(

(17)
where
1
1
1
L Q
f
L P q
+
| |
= |
|
\ .
; L is the number of range
samples; Q is the dimension of processor, in the case of fully
space-time processing
Q MK =
,
( )
0 0
H
Z H H
R E Z Z =
denotes the
covariance matrix of clutter plus noise, it can be estimated by
1
1

L
H
Z l l
l
R Z Z
L
=
=
_
(18)
where
l
Z is the
th
l data vector of samples. The false
alarm threshold of the processor has no relation to the clutter
covariance matrix and the signal amplitude. It is decided only
by the dimension of processor and the given local probability
of false alarm. Consequently, it possesses the characteristic of
CFAR detection.
4. Simulation of target detection based on multi-AEW
radar data fusion
The fusion system is supposed to be consist of one
fusion centre and three local radar sensors, namely, 3 N = .
The system parameters of each radar sensor are uniform and
given in Table 1. The parameters of target are listed in Table
2. The simulation scenario is illustrated in Figure 5.
0 1 2 3
x 10
5
-1
0
1
2
3
x 10
5
X direction/m
Y

d
i
r
e
c
t
i
o
n
/
m
AEW1

A
E
W
2
AEW3
T
a
r
g
e
t

Figure 5. The simulation scenario of fully

distributed target detection
where the direction that the arrowheads points denotes
the course of AEW radar and the target respectively. The

marker "+" depicts the plots of target corresponding to the

radar sensors.
Figure 6 illustrates the evolving process of target
Doppler shift relative to radar sensors. It shows that the target
Doppler shift falls into the blind Doppler zone in turn. In
other words, every radar can not detect the continuous and
complete target plots which have been presented in Figure
3,Figure 8 and Figure 9.
0 20 40 60 80
-6000
-4000
-2000
0
2000
4000
Bl i nd
doppl er
zone
Sample number
D
o
p
p
l
e
r

f
r
e
q
u
e
n
c
y
/
H
z
AEW1
AEW2
AEW3
Figure 6. The Doppler history of target
relative to radars
2000
4000
6000
30
210
60
240
90
270
120
300
150
330
180 0
AEW1
AEW2
AEW3
Figure 7. The blind Doppler zones at the position
-1 0 1 2 3
x 10
5
-3
-2
-1
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
5
T
a
r
g
e
t

X direction /m
Y

d
i
r
e
c
t
i
o
n

/
m
Detected points
undetected points
Figure 8. The target detection result of AEW2
-1 0 1 2 3
x 10
5
-3
-2
-1
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
5
T
a
r
g
e
t

X direction /m
Y

d
i
r
e
c
t
i
o
n

/
m
Detected points
undetected points
Figure 9. The target detection result of AEW3
Let
dj
f and
dcj
f ( ) 1, 2, , j N = " denotes the Doppler
shifts of a moving target and the clutter relative to the
th
j
AEW radar. Respectively, it is shown in Figure 7 that the
necessary condition of effective target detection which can be
depicted that at least one { } 1, 2, , k N e " exists and satisfy
dk dck k
f f eO (19)
That is to say, as long as one of the target's Doppler
shifts does not fall into its corresponding radar's blind
Doppler zone, the continuous and complete target plots
presented in Figure 10 will be obtained after fusing in fusion
centre under the "1 out of N " rule.
-1 0 1 2 3
x 10
5
-3
-2
-1
0
1
2
3
4
x 10
5
T
a
r
g
e
t

X direction /m
Y

d
i
r
e
c
t
i
o
n

/
m
Figure 10. The result of fully
distributed system target detection
5. Conclusion
Focusing on the detection problem of target buried in the
blind Doppler zone of AEW radar, the fully distributed CFAR
target detection configuration based on multi-AEW radar data
fusion has been presented after analyzing the evolving
process of target Doppler shift relative to radar sensors. The
fusion rule, generalized likelihood ratio of target detection
and the probability of false alarm under the condition of fully
space-time processing are derived. It is justified that the
advanced technique can improve the probability of target
detection and the quality of target track dramatically in case
the necessary condition is satisfied. Moreover, the technique
is significant on the aspect of detecting low radial speed
and/or weak targets.
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