Techniques for Simultaneous Transmit and Receive with All-Digital Arrays

The increased flexibility provided by all-digital array architectures allows for the development of improved techniques toward achieving multi-function capability. In an all-digital array, element-level control can be utilized to create a variety of subarray configurations that can be operated independently to form multiple simultaneous transmit and receive (STAR) beams. This thesis describes how STAR can be implemented on an all-digital array by partitioning the array into subarrays, and details various techniques to improve the STAR performance by increasing the isolation between subarrays. A metric to quantify subarray isolation is provided, which incorporates both transmit/receive gain and the leakage power produced by mutual coupling between subarrays. The strategies used to increase subarray isolation leverage knowledge of the scattering parameters of the array, which describe the mutual coupling between subarrays. By formulating the leakage power between subarrays in terms of the scattering parameters of the array, adaptive beamformers can be designed on both transmit and receive to minimize the incident leakage and increase subarray isolation. Digital cancellation of the leakage signals can be used to further increase subarray isolation, with an estimate of the leakage signal provided by the scattering parameters. The proposed techniques for STAR provide insight into the multi-function capability afforded by all-digital arrays, and may become more sophisticated as the use of all-digital arrays becomes ubiquitous

Array Signal Processing Based on Traditional and Sparse Arrays

Array signal processing is based on using an array of sensors to receive the impinging signals. The received data is either spatially filtered to focus the signals from a desired direction or it may be used for estimating a parameter of source signal like direction of arrival (DOA), polarization and source power. Spatial filtering also known as beamforming and DOA estimation are integral parts of array signal processing and this thesis is aimed at solving some key probems related to these two areas. Wideband beamforming holds numerous applications in the bandwidth hungry data traffic of present day world. Several techniques exist to design fixed wideband beamformers based on traditional arrays like uniform linear array (ULA). Among these techniques, least squares based eigenfilter method is a key technique which has been used extensively in filter and wideband beamformer design. The first contribution of this thesis comes in the form of critically analyzing the standard eigenfilter method where a serious flaw in the design formulation is highlighted which generates inconsistent design performance, and an additional constraint is added to stabilize the achieved design. Simulation results show the validity and significance of the proposed method. Traditional arrays based on ULAs have limited applications in array signal processing due to the large number of sensors required and this problem has been addressed by the application of sparse arrays. Sparse arrays have been exploited from the perspective of their difference co-array structures which provide significantly higher number of degrees of freedoms (DOFs) compared to ULAs for the same number of sensors. These DOFs (consecutive and unique lags) are utilized in the application of DOA estimation with the help of difference co-array based DOA estimators. Several types of sparse arrays include minimum redundancy array (MRA), minimum hole array (MHA), nested array, prototype coprime array, conventional coprime array, coprime array with compressed interelement spacing (CACIS), coprime array with displaced subarrays (CADiS) and super nested array. As a second contribution of this thesis, a new sparse array termed thinned coprime array (TCA) is proposed which holds all the properties of a conventional coprime array but with \ceil*{\frac{M}{2}} fewer sensors where $M$ is the number of sensors of a subarray in the conventional structure. TCA possesses improved level of sparsity and is robust against mutual coupling compared to other sparse arrays. In addition, TCA holds higher number of DOFs utilizable for DOA estimation using variety of methods. TCA also shows lower estimation error compared to super nested arrays and MRA with increasing array size. Although TCA holds numerous desirable features, the number of unique lags offered by TCA are close to the sparsest CADiS and nested array and significantly lower than MRA which limits the estimation error performance offered by TCA through (compressive sensing) CS-based methods. In this direction, the structure of TCA is studied to explore the possibility of an array which can provide significantly higher number of unique lags with improved sparsity for a given number of sensors. The result of this investigation is the third contribution of this thesis in the form of a new sparse array, displaced thinned coprime array with additional sensor (DiTCAAS), which is based on a displaced version of TCA. The displacement of the subarrays generates an increase in the unique lags but the minimum spacing between the sensors becomes an integer multiple of half wavelength. To avoid spatial aliasing, an additional sensor is added at half wavelength from one of the sensors of the displaced subarray. The proposed placement of the additional sensor generates significantly higher number of unique lags for DiTCAAS, even more than the DOFs provided by MRA. Due to its improved sparsity and higher number of unique lags, DiTCAAS generates the lowest estimation error and robustness against heavy mutual coupling compared to super nested arrays, MRA, TCA and sparse CADiS with CS-based DOA estimation

Wideband data-independent beamforming for subarrays

The desire to operate large antenna arrays for e.g. RADAR applications over a wider frequency range is currently limited by the hardware, which due to weight, cost and size only permits complex multipliers behind each element. In contrast, wideband processing would have to rely on tap delay lines enabling digital filters for every element.As an intermediate step, in this thesis we consider a design where elements are grouped into subarrays, within which elements are still individually controlled by narrowband complex weights, but where each subarray output is given a tap delay line or finite impulse response digital filter for further wideband processing. Firstly, this thesis explores how a tap delay line attached to every subarray can be designed as a delay-and-sum beamformer. This filter is set to realised a fractional delay design based on a windowed sinc function. At the element level, we show that designing a narrowband beam w.r.t. a centre frequency of wideband operation is suboptimal,and suggest an optimisation technique that can yield sufficiently accurate gain over a frequency band of interest for an arbitrary look direction, which however comes at the cost of reduced aperture efficiency, as well as significantly increased sidelobes. We also suggest an adaptive method to enhance the frequency characteristic of a partial wideband array design, by utilising subarrays pointing in different directions in different frequency bands - resolved by means of a filter bank - to adaptively suppress undesired components in the beam patterns of the subarrays. Finally, the thesis proposes a novel array design approach obtained by rotational tiling of subarrays such that the overall array aperture is densely constructed from the same geometric subarray by rotation and translation only. Since the grating lobes of differently oriented subarrays do not necessarily align, an effective grating lobe attenuation w.r.t. the main beam is achieved. Based on a review of findings from geometry,a number of designs are highlight and transformed into numerical examples, and the theoretically expected grating lobe suppression is compared to uniformly spaced arrays.Supported by a number of models and simulations, the thesis thus suggests various numerical and hardware design techniques, mainly the addition of tap-delay-line per subarray and some added processing overhead, that can help to construct a large partial wideband array close in wideband performance to currently existing hardware.The desire to operate large antenna arrays for e.g. RADAR applications over a wider frequency range is currently limited by the hardware, which due to weight, cost and size only permits complex multipliers behind each element. In contrast, wideband processing would have to rely on tap delay lines enabling digital filters for every element.As an intermediate step, in this thesis we consider a design where elements are grouped into subarrays, within which elements are still individually controlled by narrowband complex weights, but where each subarray output is given a tap delay line or finite impulse response digital filter for further wideband processing. Firstly, this thesis explores how a tap delay line attached to every subarray can be designed as a delay-and-sum beamformer. This filter is set to realised a fractional delay design based on a windowed sinc function. At the element level, we show that designing a narrowband beam w.r.t. a centre frequency of wideband operation is suboptimal,and suggest an optimisation technique that can yield sufficiently accurate gain over a frequency band of interest for an arbitrary look direction, which however comes at the cost of reduced aperture efficiency, as well as significantly increased sidelobes. We also suggest an adaptive method to enhance the frequency characteristic of a partial wideband array design, by utilising subarrays pointing in different directions in different frequency bands - resolved by means of a filter bank - to adaptively suppress undesired components in the beam patterns of the subarrays. Finally, the thesis proposes a novel array design approach obtained by rotational tiling of subarrays such that the overall array aperture is densely constructed from the same geometric subarray by rotation and translation only. Since the grating lobes of differently oriented subarrays do not necessarily align, an effective grating lobe attenuation w.r.t. the main beam is achieved. Based on a review of findings from geometry,a number of designs are highlight and transformed into numerical examples, and the theoretically expected grating lobe suppression is compared to uniformly spaced arrays.Supported by a number of models and simulations, the thesis thus suggests various numerical and hardware design techniques, mainly the addition of tap-delay-line per subarray and some added processing overhead, that can help to construct a large partial wideband array close in wideband performance to currently existing hardware

Localization, Mapping and SLAM in Marine and Underwater Environments

The use of robots in marine and underwater applications is growing rapidly. These applications share the common requirement of modeling the environment and estimating the robots’ pose. Although there are several mapping, SLAM, target detection and localization methods, marine and underwater environments have several challenging characteristics, such as poor visibility, water currents, communication issues, sonar inaccuracies or unstructured environments, that have to be considered. The purpose of this Special Issue is to present the current research trends in the topics of underwater localization, mapping, SLAM, and target detection and localization. To this end, we have collected seven articles from leading researchers in the field, and present the different approaches and methods currently being investigated to improve the performance of underwater robots

Array Manifold Calibration for Multichannel SAR Sounders

This dissertation demonstrates airborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) sounder array manifold calibration to improve outcomes in two-dimensional and three-dimensional image formation of ice sheet and glacier subsurfaces. The methodology relies on the creation of snapshot databases that aid in both the identification of calibration pixels as well as the validation of proposed calibration strategies. A parametric estimator of nonlinear SAR sounder manifold parameters is derived given a superset of statistically independent and spatially diverse subsets, assuming knowledge of the manifold model. Both measurements-based and computational electromagnetic modeling (CEM) approaches are pursued in obtaining a parametric representation of the manifold that enables the application of this estimator. The former relies on a principal components based characterization of SAR sounder manifolds. By incorporating a subspace clustering technique to identify pixels with a single dominant source, the algorithm circumvents an assumption of single source observations that underlies the formulation of nonparametric methods and traditionally limits the applicability of these techniques to the SAR sounder problem. Three manifolds are estimated and tested against a nominal manifold model in angle estimation and tomography. Measured manifolds on average reduce angle estimation error by a factor of 4.8 and lower vertical elevation uncertainty of SAR sounder derived digital elevation models by a factor of 3.7. Application of the measured manifolds in angle estimation produces 3-D images with more focused scattering signatures and higher intensity pixels that improve automated surface extraction outcomes. Measured manifolds are studied against Method of Moments predictions of the array's response to plane wave excitation obtained with a detailed model of the sounder's array that includes the airborne platform and fairing housing. CEM manifolds reduce angle estimation uncertainty off nadir on average by a factor of 3 when applied to measurements, providing initial confirmation of the utility of the CEM model in predicting angle estimation performance of the sounder's airborne arrays. The research findings of this dissertation indicate that SAR sounder manifold calibration will significantly increase the scientific value of legacy ice sheet and glacier sounding data sets and lead to optimized designs of future remote sensing instrumentation for surveying the cryosphere

1-D broadside-radiating leaky-wave antenna based on a numerically synthesized impedance surface

A newly-developed deterministic numerical technique for the automated design of metasurface antennas is applied here for the first time to the design of a 1-D printed Leaky-Wave Antenna (LWA) for broadside radiation. The surface impedance synthesis process does not require any a priori knowledge on the impedance pattern, and starts from a mask constraint on the desired far-field and practical bounds on the unit cell impedance values. The designed reactance surface for broadside radiation exhibits a non conventional patterning; this highlights the merit of using an automated design process for a design well known to be challenging for analytical methods. The antenna is physically implemented with an array of metal strips with varying gap widths and simulation results show very good agreement with the predicted performance

Terahertz Communications and Sensing for 6G and Beyond: A Comprehensive View

The next-generation wireless technologies, commonly referred to as the sixth generation (6G), are envisioned to support extreme communications capacity and in particular disruption in the network sensing capabilities. The terahertz (THz) band is one potential enabler for those due to the enormous unused frequency bands and the high spatial resolution enabled by both short wavelengths and bandwidths. Different from earlier surveys, this paper presents a comprehensive treatment and technology survey on THz communications and sensing in terms of the advantages, applications, propagation characterization, channel modeling, measurement campaigns, antennas, transceiver devices, beamforming, networking, the integration of communications and sensing, and experimental testbeds. Starting from the motivation and use cases, we survey the development and historical perspective of THz communications and sensing with the anticipated 6G requirements. We explore the radio propagation, channel modeling, and measurements for THz band. The transceiver requirements, architectures, technological challenges, and approaches together with means to compensate for the high propagation losses by appropriate antenna and beamforming solutions. We survey also several system technologies required by or beneficial for THz systems. The synergistic design of sensing and communications is explored with depth. Practical trials, demonstrations, and experiments are also summarized. The paper gives a holistic view of the current state of the art and highlights the issues and challenges that are open for further research towards 6G.Comment: 55 pages, 10 figures, 8 tables, submitted to IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorial