A Scalable 77 GHz Massive MIMO FMCW Radar by Cascading Fully-Integrated Transceivers

Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) as well as multiple industrial imaging applications highly benefit from increased angular resolution in millimeter-wave (mmW) phased-array radar systems. To achieve this, future radar systems will need a high amount of transmitter (TX) and receiver (RX) channels while at the same time being suitable for mass-production. Therefore we propose a concept to realize a scalable massive multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) radar system by cascading fully-integrated frequency-modulated continuous-wave (FMCW) transceivers, thus reducing system cost and complexity. Prototype hardware with 5 transceivers (TRXs) is built and tested under laboratory and application-near conditions. First results show an angular resolution of 2.4°in azimuth in good accordance to the simulations. Parked cars and their surrounding scenery in front of the radar module can be clearly distinguished.

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