Fast Coherent Integration Algorithm for Maneuvering Target Based on Autocorrelation Function

The coherent integration (CI) of echoes of maneuvering target usually suffers from severe range migration and Doppler frequency migration problems, especially when long-time CI is required, leading to serious degradation of performance on detection. To address these problems, a novel fast coherent integration algorithm is proposed based on the autocorrelation function in this paper. First, the range migration is corrected by the autocorrelation function constructed from the fast time frequency domain signal, after which the target energy is concentrated within a single range cell; then the slow time dimensional signal within this range cell is extracted and the acceleration and unambiguous velocity of the maneuvering target are obtained by using the symmetric autocorrelation function and scaled Fourier transform; finally, motion compensation is performed on the target echo using the estimated parameters to achieve CI and target detection. Compared with existing typical algorithms, the computational complexity of the proposed algorithm is much lower. Both simulation and practical radar experiments are conducted to validate the proposed algorithm, and the results show that the motion parameters can be accurately estimated and the maneuvering targets can be effectively detected.