A Cognitive Maritime SAR Concept for High Altitude Platforms

Abstract

This paper introduces a novel cognitive synthetic aperture radar (SAR) concept for multifunctional maritime operation. The proposed system relies on the interaction with the environment to select autonomously the areas of high interest and adapt the next transmission configuration on the fly. Thus, it becomes feasible to control the different parameters and scanning combinations to reach a high imaging and tracking Performance with less complexity compared to the fixed operating state-ofthe-art sensors. Through this paper, we aim to open up a new perspective of smart SAR sensors based on beamforming on transmit and cognitive parameters control. The corresponding SAR cycle and models are described as well as the operation mode and the system specifications.