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Kjell Gustafsson, Member, IEEE, Frank McCarthy, Member, IEEE, and Arogyaswami Paulraj, Fellow, IEEE
To fully descnbe the array manifold perturbation, the model must completely capture the wing flexure. We use 9 to denote whatever parameters it
takes to exactly describe the position of the wings.
291
GUSTAFSSON et al.: MITIGATION OF WING FLEXURE INDUCED ERRORS FOR AIRBORNE DIRECTION-FINDING APPLICATIONS
R=
X,e,e,H = E,A,E:
+ E,A,E:
(5)
a=1
where A 1 >
> Ad >
=
- ,A = o2
n
The matrix E , = [el,. . . ,e d / ] contains the d eigenvectors
of R corresponding to the d largest eigenvalues. These
(signal) eigenvalues are assumed to be distinct. The range
space of E , is called the signal subspace. Its orthogonal
complement-the noise subspace-is spanned by the columns
of E , = [ed/+l,*..,e,].
In WSF (see [14]), the direction of arrival is determined
by estimating E , from the sample covariance matrix and then
minimizing
&(d,q) x CP(Q!va)as(va)
A. Notations
(7)
a=1
~ ( t=)A(O)s(t) n(t)
(2)
where
R =E [ ~ ( t ) ~=
~ A( tS)A] +~ & I
(3)
where
S = E [s(t)sH(t)].
(4)
298
-.,
_--.
_--_
,'
; ;' ;-->,
:, ', $.-?:.;
,,,.---><
\$
'&
,I
'.---,Y
- 1
..'-..
--------.
'.,
0 =Odeg
r=10,
0 =22.5deg
-m 1
U)
r=i0,
-1
-1
{i
r ',,
Fig. 1. Uniform linear array with a planar wave impinging from direction 0
and a scatter source emitting a spherical wave from a position v = [r 4 with
respect to the array center. The array has m elements spaced A wavelengths
apart. The angles 0 and q5 are regarded positive in counter clockwise direction
and are measured with respect to the axis perpendicular to the array.
Fig. 2. Error in DF due to a perturbation of the type (7) to the array manifold.
The thin curves correspond to cy1 = a:! = 0.1 in (11), whereas the thick
curve corresponds to a1 = -a2 = 0.05.
1, i.e.,
.()(e)
[. .
-)A
sin 0
-1,
e-32~(k-
x = rcos(f$ - e)
qo,
299
GUSTAFSSON et al.: MITIGATION OF WING FLEXURE INDUCED ERRORS FOR AIRBORNE DIRECTION-FINDING APPLICATIONS
P&)
4 8 ) = bo(6')
44 = [ S l ( t )
* * *
Ud'(6')
as(v)I
Sd'(t>
E:=, P ( e k , f ) ) S k ( t ) I T
in (2).
111. DF METHODSEXPLOITING
THE STRUCTURED PERTURBATION
BC = ( I - P C ) B .
Using (14) and (15), we have
PL
A -- 1 - P [Ao(q a, (v)1 = I
= Pk - pa@)
- PX
- Pa, (v)
300
r =
TO
and g5 =
40
301
GUSTAFSSON et al.: MITIGATION OF WING FLEXURE INDUCED ERRORS FOR AIRBORNE DIRECTION-FINDING APPLICATIONS
=io,
=Odeg
-i----?1
2ot
-20'
-20'
100
&
1
40~r
401 I .\'
5
TJ
iY 1 1
=2,
100
=22.5deg
=
22.5dej
I
20
Fig. 4. Level curves (-20, -15 , -10, and -5 dB) for the gain g (17).
Signals originating from a neighborhood of the position ('x') defined by T O
and 40 are substantially attenuated. The projection matrix corresponding to
TO = 10 also causes a fairly strong attenuation for signals coming from
relative far field (large T ) . Note the logarithmic scale in T .
vo =
[TO
$01.
The quantity
0 = 60 deg
Fig. 5. RC-135 aircraft model used in the anechoic radar chamber experiments. An extension was fabricated and attached using a hinge on one of the
wings. The locations of the antennas are marked with black squares.
data set from five antennas mounted along the belly of the
aircraft. We also recorded the transmitted signal in the sixth
channel. Two carrier frequencies were used: 1.0 and 1.5 GHz.
The distance from the wing tip to the center of the antenna
array was approximately 3 and 5 wavelengths, respectively.
The array response was calculated by solving (in the least
squares sense) for a(0) in
[Z(tl>
* * *
z(tiv)1 M U ( O ) [ S ( t l ) . .
S(tN)
IV. EXPERIMENTAL
VALIDATION
An important question is how well the simple perturbation
model (7) represents the actual manifold perturbations due to
aircraft wing flexure. To evaluate our model, we performed
experiments in an anechoic chamber using a model (1/20th
scale) of the RC-135 aircraft (cf. Fig. 5).
A wing extension was fabricated and attached using a hinge
on one of the wings of the aircraft model. The angle between
the extension and the wing can be varied to simulate variations
in wing flexure. The angle between the extension and the wing
can be varied between 0 and 90", with the extension pointing
downwards at the 90" position. Care was taken to make the
extension a smooth continuation of the original wing. Copper
tape was applied around the hinge in order to remove sharp
comers and bends at the interface between the extension and
the wing.
We used a single unmodulated, sinusoidal signal to illuminate the aircraft. For each case, we collected a 2000-sample
302
..O
(17)
Stacking the vectors for tilt angle 0, 12, 22, 38,49, 60, and,
70"' and calculating the singular values, leads in the 1-GHz
case to the following (normalized) result:
C-15 = [1.0 0.021 0.0016 0.000 62 0.000 291
C25
GUSTAFSSON et al.: MITIGATION OF WING FLEXURE INDUCED ERRORS FOR AIRBORNE DIRECTION-FINDING APPLICATIONS
303
V. CONCLUSIONS
DF from airborne platforms relies on flight calibration of
the array manifold. Varying wing flexure changes the nearfield scattering and perturbs the manifold from the calibrated
value. This is a dominating error source in the DF.
Most of the changes of the scattering originates from the
outer part of the wings. We modeled the perturbation by a
scatter source positioned at each wing tip. The perturbation
model assumes that the perturbation is 1-D in m space and that
its direction is unaffected by the AOA of the impinging signal.
Each of these properties was validated through experiments in
an anechoic chamber. The results of the experiments are quite
encouraging.
The simple structure of the model facilitates its incorporation into standard DF schemes to reduce their sensitivity
to wing-flexure induced changes to the array response. One
way to reduce the effect of the perturbation is to project the
data onto the null space of the perturbation. The appropriate
projection is given by the perturbation model. This projection
can be implicitly incorporated into DF schemes such as WSF.
The projection operation is fairly insensitive to parameter
variations, and a substantial decrease in estimation error is
achieved even when the parameters of the perturbation model
are slightly inaccurate. The robustness to parameter variations
is sufficient for the scheme to provide improvements even for
diffuse scattering originating from the region around the wing
tips.
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