Treffer: Real Time Implementation of Adaptive Beam former for Phased Array Radar over DSP Kit

Mechanical positioners, rotating antennas and large size of early generation radars limited the capability of the radar system to track laterally accelerating targets. Electronic Scanning Array (ESA) such as used in Phased Array Radar (PAR) overcomed these limitations by providing beam agility, good response time, variable scan rates and efficient use of energy. Early PAR systems used analog phase shifting schemes that caused variations and component failures resulting in overall degradation of radar performance. With the advent of new technology and high performance embedded systems, digital beamforming has become powerful enough to perform massive operations required for real time digital beamforming. MATLAB simulation of adaptive beamformer is presented in this paper. Real time implementation of adaptive beamformer over DSP kit (TMS320C6713) was also carried out and results were compared with MATLAB simulations. GUI was also made in MATLAB for viewing results of real time implementation via real time data exchange. Developed system can be used in digital beamforming PAR provided array signals are routed to DSP kit through FPGA interfaced to high speed ADC’s.