A HIGH-SPEED AND HIGH-PRECISION OPTICAL SYSTEM OF PHASED ARRAY RADAR BEAMFORMING

Digital beamforming (DBF) is wildly used in phased array radars, there are many algorithms and technologies to realize it. The traditional DBF architecture is based on digital signal processor. However, with the increasing requirements on target detection and resolution, the number of channel is getting more, the volumne of processing data is becoming larger, the capability of the digital signal processor is challenged. An optical system is proposed in this paper. The system is based on Digital Micromirror Deviece (DMD), it is designed to perform beamforming on receive for phased array radar. In this system, all calculation is realized in optical domain. That is, with the laser beam propogation, the calculation of beamforming is done. The system can form multiple beams simultaneously, the parameters of each beam can be controlled. The exprimental setup is built, and the beamforming results are given to validate the system performance.