Accurate Analysis of Target Characteristic in Bistatic SAR Images: A Dihedral Corner Reflectors Case

• Published in: Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 18; no. 1; p. 24
• Main Authors: Ao, Dongyang, Li, Yuanhao, Hu, Cheng, Tian, Weiming
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 22.12.2017; MDPI
• Subjects: Aperture; bistatic radar sensor; Corners; Design; dihedral corner reflector; Experiments; Geometrical optics; Geometry; Multistatic radar; Optics; Propagation; Radar cross sections; Radar detection; Radar imaging; Radar systems; Remote sensing; SAR image; scattering characteristic; Sensors; Stealth technology; Synthetic aperture radar; scattering characteristic; bistatic radar sensor; dihedral corner reflector; SAR image
• ISSN: 1424-8220; 1424-8220
• DOI: 10.3390/s18010024

The dihedral corner reflectors are the basic geometric structure of many targets and are the main contributions of radar cross section (RCS) in the synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images. In stealth technologies, the elaborate design of the dihedral corners with different opening angles is a useful approach to reduce the high RCS generated by multiple reflections. As bistatic synthetic aperture sensors have flexible geometric configurations and are sensitive to the dihedral corners with different opening angles, they specially fit for the stealth target detections. In this paper, the scattering characteristic of dihedral corner reflectors is accurately analyzed in bistatic synthetic aperture images. The variation of RCS with the changing opening angle is formulated and the method to design a proper bistatic radar for maximizing the detection capability is provided. Both the results of the theoretical analysis and the experiments show the bistatic SAR could detect the dihedral corners, under a certain bistatic angle which is related to the geometry of target structures.