Experimental demonstration and analysis of cognitive spectrum sensing and notching for radar

Spectrum sensing and transmit notching is a form of cognitive radar that seeks to reduce mutual interference with other spectrum users in the same band. This concept is examined for the case where another spectrum user moves in frequency during the radar's CPI. The physical radar emission is based on a recent FM noise waveform possessing attributes that are inherently robust to sidelobes that otherwise arise for spectral notching. Due to increasing spectrum sharing with cellular communications, the interference considered takes the form of in-band OFDM signals that hop around the band. The interference is measured each PRI and a fast spectrum sensing algorithm determines where notches are required, thus facilitating a rapid response to dynamic interference. To demonstrate the practical feasibility and to understand the trade-space such a scheme entails, free-space experimental measurements based on notched radar waveforms are collected and synthetically combined with separately measured hopping interference under a variety of conditions to assess the efficacy of such an approach, including the impact of interference hopping during the radar CPI, latency in the spectrum sensing/waveform design process, notch tapering to reduce sidelobes, notch width modulation due to spectrum sensing, and the impact of digital up-sampling on notch depth.