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Velocity synthetic aperture radar (VSAR) is equipped with a linear array to receive the echoes from a radar illuminating area via multiple channels, each of which can reconstruct a reflectivity image for the same stationary scene. Based on analysis of pixel vector sampled among multi-images, VSAR may effectively suppress the strong ground clutter and improve moving target detection and location. In this paper, different Doppler-distributed properties are derived for the moving target and clutter, respectively. Then, we propose a novel parametric statistical model for VSAR by dividing the pixel vector into three components, namely, target, clutter, and noise. Furthermore, a method of adaptive implementation of optimal processing (AIOP-VSAR) is presented for moving target detection. It is shown that the optimum detection performance may be obtained via AIOP-VSAR, particularly for the slowly moving target in an inhomogeneous clutter environment. Also, the Cramer-Rao bounds (CRBs) are derived for the estimation of unknown model parameters, as well as the azimuth locations of moving targets, and the maximum-likelihood methods are proposed to reach these CRBs. Based on the proposed target detection and parameter estimation methods, we present a complete parametric flowchart for VSAR. It is demonstrated that the proposed flowchart may effectively mitigate the "azimuth location ambiguity" of VSAR and has the super-resolution ability to resolve "velocity layover" for multiple targets. Finally, some detailed numerical experiments and scene simulations are provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By using a linear antenna array, velocity synthetic aperture radar (VSAR) can detect, focus, and locate slowly moving targets well. However, it may mis-locate fast moving targets in the azimuth (cross-range) direction. In this correspondence, we propose a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) with a nonuniform linear antenna array and give a design of the antenna arrangement. It is shown that our proposed nonuniform linear antenna array SAR (NULA-SAR) can locate both slowly and fast moving targets correctly. An integrated NULA-SAR algorithm for moving target imaging is also presented, and it is verified by some simulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A robust phase-unwrapping algorithm has been recently proposed and applied to accurately locate fast moving targets in multifrequency antenna array synthetic aperture radar imaging. This algorithm is based on two dimensional (2-D) searching and its complexity may be high. In this letter, we propose an efficient implementation of the robust phase-unwrapping algorithm. We show that the range of the 2-D searching, and therefore the complexity of the robust phase-unwrapping algorithm, can be significantly reduced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose a bistatic linear array synthetic aperture radar (BLA-SAR) system for moving target detection, location, and imaging. In the BLA-SAR system, a geo-stationary satellite is used as a transmitter, and two airborne linear array radars are used as passive receivers, where the transmitted waveforms from the geostationary satellite may have two different carrier frequencies, two linear array antennas on two different airplanes may be equipped with different spacings, or two airplanes may fly with two different velocities. It is shown that, using the BLA-SAR, not only the stationary clutter can be suppressed but also locations of both slow and fast moving targets can be accurately estimated. Furthermore, an effective BLA-SAR algorithm of moving target imaging is also proposed. Lastly, some numerical experiments are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the BLA-SAR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]