Sequence Design to Minimize the Weighted Integrated and Peak Sidelobe Levels

Abstract

Sequences with low aperiodic autocorrelation sidelobes are well known to have extensive applications in active sensing and communication systems. In this paper, we consider the problem of minimizing the weighted integrated sidelobe level (WISL), which can be used to design sequences with impulse-like autocorrelation and zero (or low) correlation zone. Two algorithms based on the general majorization-minimization method are developed to tackle the WISL minimization problem and the convergence to a stationary point is guaranteed. In addition, the proposed algorithms can be implemented via fast Fourier transform (FFT) operations and thus are computationally efficient, and an acceleration scheme has been considered to further accelerate the algorithms. Moreover, the proposed methods are extended to optimize the $\ell_{p}$-norm of the autocorrelation sidelobes, which lead to a way to minimize the peak sidelobe level (PSL) criterion. Numerical experiments show that the proposed algorithms can efficiently generate sequences with virtually zero autocorrelation sidelobes in a specified lag interval and can also produce very long sequences with much smaller PSL compared with some well known analytical sequences.