Multicarrier constant envelope OFDM signal design for radar applications

Abstract

Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) radar signals have been introduced for high range resolution radars. These signals have prominent properties such as favorable ambiguity function, high bandwidth efficiency, and possibility of use in dual mode radar/communication systems. But the large amplitude fluctuations of the OFDM signal make it susceptible to system nonlinearities. To alleviate this problem, constant envelope OFDM (CE-OFDM) signal has been introduced which combines orthogonal frequency division multiplexing and phase modulation or frequency modulation. Although several works have been reported on OFDM radar signal design, there is no a systematic approach for designing CE-OFDM signals for radar applications. In this paper we will focus on CE-OFDM signal design for radar applications. Two different methods for designing a CE-OFDM signal with favorable ambiguity functions are introduced. The first one is based on modulating a complementary set of sequences on different sub-carriers while the second is based on using a proper single carrier coded signal and then extracting its most similar multicarrier OFDM or CE-OFDM coded signal.