An Adaptive Filtering Approach to Chirp Estimation and ISAR Imaging of Maneuvering Targets

Genyuan Wang* Xiang-Gen Xia*

focus on the ISAR imaging. ISAR imaging is a two dimensional high resolution imaging of a flying target, such as an airplane, where one dimension corresponds to the range (the fast time) direction and the other dimension corresponds to the cross range (the slow time) direction, and the Fourier transform is used in both dimensions. The resolution in the range direction is obtained by transmitting wide-band radar signals while the resolution in the cross range direction is obtained by the spectrum analysis, far example the high resolution spectrum estimation methods have been applied to E A R and SAR imagings in [3, 5 , 71. I t is well-known that the Fourier transform works well for stationary sinusoidal signals but not for nonstationary chirp signals. Based on this observation, improved ISAR imaging algorithms have been obtained in [17-25],such as the joint time-frequency analysis approach in [17-221. High resolution spectral estimation based on the radar return data in a short time duration was also studied, for example 13, 5 , 71. In this paper, we propose t o use the chirp estimation algorithm generalized from the algorithm obtained by Li and Stoica [l] for sinusoidal signal parameter estimation. The generalized algorithm is then applied to the simulated radar data, which outperforms both the conventional ISAR imaging method and the superresoltion E A R imaging method using the Li and Stoica's APES algorithm PI. This paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, we extend the APES algorithm to the chirp estimation. In Section 3, the extended chirp estimation algorithm is used t o the E A R imaging of maneuvering targets. In Section 4, the extended algorithm proposed in this paper is verified by the simulated radar data.

Abstract
In inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) imaging, due t o the noncooperative motion of maneuvering targats the Doppler shifts of the scatterers are usually time-varying, and the radar return signals are usually chirps. The chirp estimation plays an important role in the performance of the ISAR imaging. Li and Stoica recently presented an adaptive FIR filtering approach to estimate the amplitudes and phases of sinusoidal signals and applied this method to the synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging with the sinusoidal signal model. In this paper, we extend the Li and Stoica's algorithm to estimate the chirps and then apply it to the ISAR imaging of maneuvering targets. The extended algorithm is verified by simulated data.

Introduction

Chirp signals form an important class of signals that have applications in radar and sonar For example, in SAR imaging, when targets have motions, the radar return signals are chirps, and in ISAR imaging, when targets have maneuvering motions (rotations), the radar return signals are also chirps. The chirps in the radar return signals include the important information about the moving targets, such a s the velocities and the location parameters of the moving targets in SAR imaging. Furthermore, the proper dechirping is necessary in the ISAR imaging, where the chirp estimation is also needed. There have been many algorithms for the chirp estimation, for example [K-161. In this paper, we propose a new chirp estimation algorithm and in particular apply it to the ISAR imaging. The new chirp estimation algorithm is an extension of the adaptive FIR filtering approach for the amplitude and phase estimation of sinusoidal (APES) signals recently proposed by Li and Stoica [l]and applied in SAR and ISAR imagings [3-71 based on sinusoidal signal models. Although the proposed chirp estimation algorithm in this paper applies to general chirp signals, in the second half of this paper we 'Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716. Email: (gwang, xxia)Qee.udel.edu. Phone: (302)831-8038. Fax: (302)831-4316. This work was partially supported by the Air Force Office of ScientificResearch (AFOSR) under Grant No.F49620-00-1-0086 and the 1998 Officeof Naval Research (ONR) Young Investigator Program (YIP) under Grant N00014-98-1-0644.

Chirp Estimation Using Adaptive Filtering

In this section, we extend the APES algorithm obtained by Li and Stoica [l]to the chirp estimation.

2.1

Chirp Estimation with Filter

We first consider single chirp signal model with additive noise. Let {Z,,]fz; denote a discrete time data secquence of the form:
1 Z, = A(u,w)exp(j(-an* +nu)) + e , , 2 (2.1)

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where A(a,w) denotes the complex amplitude of a chirp signal with chirp rate a and initial frequency w , and en denotes the additive noise. Similar to the APES algorithm, we first consider how to estimate the complex amplitude A ( a , w ) when the parameters a and w are known. Let
Z,

which does not depend on the vector sequence index m of Z , . If the filter h H ( a , w ) is chosen such that

hH(a,w)a(a,w) = 1,
(2.6) becomes
H 1 h ( a , w ) X , = A(a,w)exp(j(-am2 2 +mw))+w,.

(2.8)

= (2,

~ , + 1

... 2,+M-11T,

m = 0 , 1 , ...,N

-M,
(2.2)

(2.9)

be an M-dimensional vector sequence with length N - M + I , where stands for the transpose. The m o 1-th term Z , + , in the vector Z, can be expressed as:

Therefore, the least-squares estimate of A ( a ,w ) from the data h H ( aw , ) X , is

&,U)

Zm+mo

A ( a , w ) exp(j-a(m 2

+ mo)' + (m + mo)w)
mow))

N
(

1 H -M + 1 [h ( a ) w )

N-M
m=O

+em+mo
= A(a,w ) exp(j(
1 exp(j( -am2
2

ami +

X m exp(-j(-am2 2

+~ > > ) 0 2 . 1 0 )

+ mw))exp(jammo) + e,+,
(2.3)

Let X ( a , w ) denote the following chirplet transform of (X,}",f divided by N - M 1, i.e.,

N-M

Define

X(a,w ) =

N-M+1

m=O

1 xmexp(-j(-am2 2

+mu)>.

(2.11)

Then, (2.10) can be represented as

A(a,w) = hH(a,w)X(a,w).
+Em+mo

(2.12)

where Gm+,,

is the modulated noise

em+,, exp (-jammo) of e,+, X , = [x, ~ , + 1

. Let
m = 0 , 1 , ..., N

... X , + M - I I ~ ,

-M

(2.4) be the vector sequence obtained by the data XmfmO given in (2.4). Let h ( a , w ) denote the impulse response of an M-tap filter, where
h(a,W)

In the previous derivation, we have assumed that the parameters a and w of the chirp are known. In practice, the amplitude a(a,w ) is estimated in terms of the parameters or variables a and w . The true parameters a and w are the ones that maximize the magnitude of A(a,w),which is similar to the sinusoidal signal estimation in [l]. The problem now is how to obtain th~e filter h(a, w ) used in (2.12), which shall be discussed in the next subsection.

2.2

The Adaptive Filter Design

= hi((^,^) h z ( c ~ , w ... ) h l l . ~ ( a , ~ ) ] ~ .(2.5)

Let R denote the forward sample covariance matrix

N-M

The impule response h(a,w ) varies with the frequency w and the frequency rate a. Note that the output obtained by passing the vector sequence X, through the filter h ( a , w ) is hH ( a ,w ) X m = A(a,w)[hT(a,w)a(a,w)]exp(j(5am2 1 +mu))

R=
and

N-M+1

CxmxL

(2.13)

m=O

Q(a,w) = R- X ( a , w ) X H ( a , w )

(2.14)

+ w m , m = O , l , ...,N - M

(2.6)

denote the estimation of the noise covariance matrix. Similar to the derivation of the adaptive FIR filter h A p E s ( W ) obtained in [l],the adaptive filter h ( a , w ) in the last subsection can be given as:

where denotes the complex conjugate transpose, wm = h H ( a , w ) [ E mE n + l ... Em+M-1IT denotes the pertorbation of the filter output due to the additive noise, and

Note that the above filter h ( a , w ) satisfies property (2.8). Therefore, by combining (2.12) and (2.15), the amplitude of the chirp signal can be obtained as

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Similar to [l],the estimate A(a,w ) in (2.16) is the maximum likelihood (ML) estimate of A ( a , w ) when the noise were independently and identically distributed zero mean Gaussian random vectors. When there are multiple chirps in a received signal, the one with the maximal energy is estimated first and then substracted from the signal. Repeat this procedure for the remaining signal until the energy of the remaining signal is insignificant. The multiple chirps can be estimated by the procedure. The accuracy of the above chirp estimation algorithm is higher than the traditional Randon Wigner transform transform. Fig. 2 shows the chirp estimation result using the Randon Wigner transform while Fig. 3 shows the chirp estimation result using the above algorithm. One can clearly see the improvement.

0 to the radar, i.e., the radar line-of-sight. Then, the returned signal of scatterer P is
s ( t , T ) = Ap exp{j2r[fc(t - 7;1)
n +T (t~ d ) ~ ] } , (3.2)

where t is the fast time for the range dimension, T is the /c slow time for the cross-range dimension, Td = ~ R ~ ( T )is the time delay, R P ( T ) is the range from the radar to the point scatterer P at time 7 ,and c is the wave propagation velocity. The baseband signal in this case is
sb(t,~)

= =

A p exp{-j27r[fcrd

K - -(t

- ~d)']}

A P exp(-j@(t)),

(3.3)

where the phase @ ( t is )

ISAR Imaging of Maneuvering Targets

@ ( t= ) 27r[fCTd-qt-Td)7 = ~47rRp(T) 7rK(t-2 x

2RP(.)

) .

In ISAR imaging, the radar is stationary and transmits wideband electromagnetic waves to a moving target. Suppose the radar transmits a linear frequency modulated (LFM) signal
s , ( t ) = Aexp{j27r(fct

(3.4) After the range compression by multiplying exp(j7r&) and taking the inverse Fourier transform of the baseband signal in (3.3) it becomes
s ( t , T ) = Ap exp(-j- 47rRp x ).(

+ Et')}, 2

~RP(T) )sinc[mTCp (t - )I,

(3.1)

where A is the amplitude, the chirp rate.

fc

is the carrier frequency, K is

(3.5) where, without confusion in understanding, we still use the notation s(t,.r) for simplicity, and T,, is the compressed pulse width. Let &(T) be the range between the center 0 and the radar at time T. Then
RP(T)

= &(T)

+ (d(T)x .'((.>)E(.),
44

and the signal s ( t , T ) in (3.5) can be written as

i/
x

imaging p r o j e c t i o n plane

sinc[mT,,(t

2RP (7) -11,

J,

Figure 1: Target image projection plane. Let 0 be a scatterer treated as the center of the target, vo(t) be the velocity of the scatterer 0. Thus, the motion of the target can be determined by vo(t) and the rotation with the angular velocity R(t) of the target with respect to scatterer 0. Let X - Y -2 be the coordinate system shown in Fig. 1 and P with location (21, y1, z1) be a scatterer o,f the moving target, the radar is sitting on the X axis, R is the rotation ve_tor of the target with respect to the center 0, where Re is th_e effecqive rotating vector and /3 is the angular between 2 ! and_&, ?is the vector between scatterer P and scatterer 0, R is the vector of the center

where 2 represent the unite vector of the line of radar sight, and 47~&(7)/X is the phase variation of scatterer 0. When the pulse compression is good enough, for simplicity we assume the sinc function in (3.6)to be the delta function,
a(t -

~RP(T) 1.

If scatterer 0 is used as the hot point to obtain the motion compensation, the returned signal s ( t , 7) of scatterer P after the motion compensation becomes

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where 7 d 0 = After the returned signal of scatterer P is aligned to the same range, the signal can be written

F.
4x

as
s(7) = A p exp(j-fL(7)ycosp)

= A p exp(jw(7)). (3.7)

Notice that t in (3.7) is the slow time. In a small viewing interval, the target rotations can be regard as constant acceleration, and without loss of generality, ,f3 = 0, i.e., the target rotates in the X - Y plane, then the angular velocity is 0: n,(T)= R(T) = ROT -2, 2 and W ( 7 ) = -(Ooy.r 4x -7OY 2 ). x 2 Therefore, the returned signal of scatterer P after the range compression and the motion compensation can be finally written as

WI

where T, is the length of the aperture, W O = 4xRoy/x and = 47my/X. This means the returned signal of scatterer P is a chirp signal within a small viewing interval, which is verified by the Wigner-Ville distribution of the raw radar data shown in Fig. 4 and Fig. 5. In general, the radar return signal after the range compression and the motion compensation in a range bin has the form:
s(t) =

airplane is smeared. The super resolution imaging algorithm using the TVSE proposed in [3] is used to the first half raw data. The image is shown in Fig. 6(b). The imaging quality is proved compare with that of Fig.G(a). However, the imaging quality of Fig.G(b) is not high enough, the head of airplan is also smeared, because APES is the parameteres estimate algorithm to sinusiod signals and the received signals are chirp ones. Fig. 6(c) shows the ISAR imaging result to the data used in Fig.G(b), by using the chirplet decomposion imaging algorithm (CDIA) proposed in [15]. The image result in Fig.G(b) has higher image quality especialy the head of airplane. Fig. 6(d) shows the imaging result to the data used in Fig. 6(a) by the novel imaging algorithm. Fig 6(d) have higher resolution than that of Fig.G(a), Fig.G(b) and Fig.G(c) (especialy in the head of airplane. Fig. 6(e), Fig. 6(f), Fig.6 (g) and Fig. 6(h) show the image results of the conventional ISAR imaging algorithm, the TVSE algorithm, the CDIA algorithm and the novel imaging algorithm respectively to the whole 128 slow time sample points data. It is shown that Fig. G(h)obtained by the novel algorithm has higher resolution than that of Fig. 6(e) and Fig. 6(f). Alough the Fig. 6(h) has almost the same resloution to the Fig. 6(g) at the head of the plane, it has a higher resolution than that of Fig. 6(g) a t the body of the plane. The novel algorithm is also verified by raw data. The imaging results are not shown here, because the data are not open now.

C A , exp(j(a,t2 + brit +
n=l

5
Cn))

Conclusion

(3.10) In this paper, the APES algorithm for sinusoidal signals proposed by Li and Stoica was extended to the chirps. The extended algorithm was applied to the ISAR imaging. The ISAR imaging results indicated that the extended algorithm outperforms the existing algorithms.

which is the summation of several chirp signals with different chirp rates, N is the number of scatterers in the range bin. In the classical ISAR imaging, the FFT of the above s ( t ) in a range bin is taken, which is based on the sinusoidal signal model, i.e., the signal s ( t ) in (3.10) has only sinusoidal signals. The APES algorithm was applied to the ISAR imaging in [7]. Because of the variation of the Doppler in terms of the time, i.e., the chirps, the instantaneous image should be made for the maneuvering targets, see for example [18-251. In the following, the chirp estimation method proposed in Section 2 will be used to form the ISAR image in each range bin.

References
1 1 1 J. L i and P. Stoica, An adaptive filtering approach to spectral estimation and SAR imaging, IEEE Tkans. on Signal Processing, vo1.44, June, 1996 [2] M. R. Palsetia and J. Li, Using APES for interferometric SAR imaging, IEEE Trans. on Image Processing, ~01.7:(9) 1340-1353, SEPT. 1998. (31 R. Wu, Z. Liu, and J. Li, Time-varying complex spectral estimation with applications to ISAR imaging, Thirty second Asilomer Conference on Signals, Systems and Compuers, pp.14-18, Pacific Grove, California, Nov. 1998. [4] J. C. Wood and D. T. Barry, Linear signal synthesis using the Radon-Wigner transform, IEEE Trans. on Signal Processing, ~01.42, pp.2105-2111, 1994 [5] M. Kram, K. Meraim and Y. Hua, Fast quadrtic phase tranform form estimating the parameters of muticomponent chirp signals, Digital Signal Processing,vol.7, pp.127-135, 1997. [6] W. Li, Wigner distribution method equivalent to dechirp method for detecting a chirp signal, IEEE Trans,

Simulations

In this section, we want to apply the chirp estimaion algorithm obtained in Section 2 to the ISAR imaging of simulated data of b727. The processed data has 128 slow time sample points. The airplane rotates maneuverly during the observation. The received signal of each scatterer is approximately a chirp. Fig.G(a) is the imaging result by using the first half (first 64 slow time sample points) received data. Since the conventional imaging method is based on the Fourier transform and one can see that the image especialy the head of

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Acoust. Speech Signal Processing, vo1.35, pp.1210-1211, 1987. [7] T. J. Abatzoglou, Fast maximum likelihood joint estimation of frequency and frequency rate, IEEE Puns. on Aerosp. Electron. Syst., v01.22, pp.708-715, Nov. 1986. [8] R. Kumaresan and S. Verma, On estimating the parameters of chirp signals using rank reduction techniques, Proc. 2lst Asilomar Conf. Signals, Syst., Comput., Pacific Grove, CA, pp.555-558, 1987. [9] P. M. Djuric and S. M. Kay, Parameter estimation of chirp signals, IEEE Pans. on Acoust., Speech, Signal Process., ~01.38, pp.2118-2126, Dec. 1990. [lo] S. Qian, D. Chen, and Q. Yin, Adaptive chirplet based signal approximation, ICASSP98, Seattle, Washington, U.S.A, May 1998. [ll] V. Chen, Reconstruction of inverse synthetic aperture radar image using adaptive time-frequency wavelet transform, (invited paper), SPIE Proc. Wavelet Applications, ~01.2491, pp.373-386, 1995. [12] V. Chen and S. Qian, Joint time-frequency transform for radar range-Doppler imaging, IEEE Bans. on Aerospace and Electronic Systems, vo1.34, May 1998. [13] V. C. Chen and W. J. Miceli,Time-varying spectral analysis for radar imaging of maneuvering targets, IEE SpeProceedings on Radar Sonar and Navigation, ~01.145, cial Issue on Radar Signal Processing, pp.262-268, 1998 [14] V. C. Chen and H. Ling, Joint time-frequency analysis for radar signal and image processing, IEEE Signal Processing Magazine, vo1.16, pp.81-93, March 1999. [15] Z. Bao, G. Wang, and L. Luo, Inverse synthetic radar imaging of maneuvering targets, Optical Engineering, ~01.37, pp.1582-1588, 1998

Figure 3: Chirp estimation result by the extended APES algorithm.

Figure 4: Wigner-Ville distribution of the received signal from a range bin.

Figure 2: Chirp estimation result by the conventional method. Figure 5 : Wigner-Ville distribution of t h e received signal from another range bin.

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(a) T V S E imaging result

to the first half data

(c)

C D I A imaging result to the f i r s t half data

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( d ) Novel algorithm imaging result to the f i r s t half data

( 9 ) D C I A imaging result to the whole data

( h ) Novel algorithm imaging result to the whole data

Figure 6: Imaging results by different algorithms

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