Automatic target detection algorithm for foliage-penetrating ultrawideband SAR data using split spectral analysis

摘要

We present an automatic target detection (ATD) algorithm for foliage penetrating (FOPEN) ultra-wideband (UWB) synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data using split spectral analysis. Split spectral analysis is commonly used in the ultrasonic, non-destructive evaluation of materials using wide band pulses for flaw detection. In this paper, we show the application of split spectral analysis for detecting obscured targets in foliage using UWB pulse returns to discriminate targets from foliage, the data spectrum is split into several bands, namely, 20 to 75, 75 to 150, ..., 825 to 900 MHz. An ATD algorithm is developed based on the relative energy levels in various bands, the number of bands containing significant energy (spread of energy), and chip size (number of crossrange and range bins). The algorithm is tested on the (FOPEN UWB SAR) data of foliage and vehicles obscured by foliage collected at Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD. The paper presents various split spectral parameters used in the algorithm and discusses the rationale for their use.