A novel approach for using polyphase filter bank in directly digital RF conversion from RF to baseband

Abstract

Software defined radio (SDR) hardware platform is in high demand for ultra-wideband digital EW receiver to carry out different mission requirements. Due to the limitations of current Analog-to-Digital conversion (ADC) techniques, the ideal receiver structure of SDR, with digital RF frequency conversion, cannot be achieved. In this article, a new channelization technique called ADC polyphase fast Fourier transformation (ADC PFFT) filter bank channelization is demonstrated. The key concept is to separate the speed at which the two functional units of an ADC - the sample and hold and the quantizer - operate. The sample and hold unit operates at the sampling frequency fs and the quantizer (the speed limiting factor in ADCs) can operate at a much slower rate, fs/M, where M is the decimation factor for digital filter bank. By integrated this ADC PFFT technique in ultra-wideband digital channelized EW receivers, directly digital RF down conversion can be achieved. With the ADC PFFT channelization for RF down conversion and polyphase FFT channelization for IF down conversion, 2-18 GHz frequency coverage can be accomplished in such ultra-wideband digital channelized EW receivers without the requirement of EW receivers being time-shared among outputs from many subbands due to bandwidth limitation in digital IF channelized EW receivers. Because the frequency down conversion from RF to BB are all processed digitally, issues such as image rejection and I/Q imbalance due to analog mixing will be eliminated in the ultrawideband digital channelized EW receivers.© (2012) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.