volume | PIER Journals

Abstract

For the first time, a real sized complex target that is coated with an absorber material is discriminated from the uncoated one using an aspect independent discrimination method based on natural resonances. This resonance based technique provides a real-time, accurate and aspect independent solution for stealth target discrimination. First, the discrimination is studied for a complex shaped aircraft of electrical size 1.5λ. The Perfectly Electrically Conducting (PEC) target is coated uniformly with sintered nickel-zinc-ferrite, a magnetic Radar Absorbing Material (RAM) with complex dielectric and magnetic properties. The resonant range Radar Cross Section (RCS) of the aircraft for different coating thicknesses is computed using the Method of Moments (MoM). The resonances contained in the RCS are extracted using the vector fitting method, and the dominant resonances representing the target are determined by applying the power criteria. The variation in the pole placements with the increasing coating thickness is also studied. A one number quantifier of discrimination --- ``Risk'' in dB is defined to express the amount of mismatch between the compared targets. Further, the discrimination technique is also studied for an aircraft of electrical length, 7λ. A Risk value of 2 dB and more is obtained in this study at all aspects. This demonstrates the capability of the algorithm to discriminate between targets of identical structure but with different material compositions.

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Dr. Sathyamurthy Anuradha

Dr. Jyothi Balakrishnan