Post detection digital processing research

The Admiralty Research Establishment (ARE) is supporting research on ESM digital signal processing techniques to provide the functions of automatic detection, surveillance and identification of radar emitters for application in future naval ESM systems. Naval ESM systems are required to operate at high data rates (1 Mbps) and with a low processing latency. A high level of correct reporting and correct emitter identification is required in high pulse density environments including complex emitters which may have significant overlap in bearing and frequency. This paper describes the ARE research programme, which has two key aims. Firstly, to develop new techniques capable of providing a high probability of detection and unambiguous identification of complex radar emitters in dense scenarios. Secondly, to demonstrate the performance of selected techniques in real time using parallel processing methods and VLSI signal processing devices