MIMO arrays and array shading

A MIMO radar consisting of M transmit and N receive elements extracts MN signals using a matched filter bank. These signals can be considered as those received by a virtual array of MN elements. However, for many MIMO radar array geometries, multiple virtual array elements can exist at the same location. Therefore, an equivalent virtual array may consist of less than MN elements with some ´natural´ weighting upon elements. Shading may be applied to the virtual array, incorporating the natural weights, to yield desired beampatterns. This paper investigates array shading for a range of MIMO radar array geometries. Robustness to element failure is also discussed.