A Novel Joint Radar-communication Waveform Design Method Based on Distributed Aperture

Joint radar-communication waveform design has been the focus of intensive research in recent years. The integrated waveform based on a collocated antenna can simultaneously detect targets and communicate with multiple users in different directions. However, integrated waveforms possess poor anti-jamming properties and lack secure communication abilities, which limits their capacity to address the jamming and eavesdropping behaviors that generate at various ranges in the same beam direction. In this study, a novel joint radar-communication waveform design method based on a distributed aperture is proposed to control waveform distributions in the three-dimensional space. First, the waveform synthesis constraint is established to synthesize the desired radar and communication waveforms in designated directions. Second, the constant modulus constraint is added to each sub-aperture, following which an integrated waveform optimization model is established based on the minimum transmission power. Finally, the alternating projection algorithm is used to iteratively solve the nonconvex optimization problem. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed method synthesizes desired waveforms at target positions and realizes three-dimensional spatial waveform manipulation.