An Imaging Plane Calibration Method for MIMO Radar Imaging

In two dimensional cross-range multiple-input multiple-output radar imaging for aerial targets, due to the non-cooperative movement of the targets, the estimated imaging plane parameters, namely the center and the posture angles of the imaging plane, may have deviations from true values, which defocus the final image. This problem is called imaging plane mismatch in this paper. Focusing on this problem, firstly the deviations of spatial spectrum fulfilling region caused by imaging plane mismatch is analyzed, as well as the errors of the corresponding spatial spectral values. Thereupon, the calibration operation is deduced when the imaging plane parameters are accurately obtained. Afterwards, an imaging plane calibration algorithm is proposed to utilize particle swarm optimization to search out the imaging plane parameters. Finally, it is demonstrated through simulations that the proposed algorithm can accurately estimate the imaging plane parameters and achieve good image focusing performance.