Development of a Digital Tracking Array with Single- Channel RSNS and Monopulse Digital Beamforming

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are widely used in military applications, and one of the most common missions is remote sensing. Remote sensing requires UAVs equipped with different kinds of sensors. Information collected by remote sensors must be transmitted back to a ground control station (GCS) to conduct analysis. The majority of UAVs are controlled directly by GCS personnel using radio frequency (RF), line-of-sight (LOS) links. The ground antenna must acquire and then track the UAV signal. A digital phased array allows signal processing functions to be performed in the antenna processor as well as beamforming and tracking. The development of a digital tracking array with single-channel robust symmetrical number system (RSNS) and monopulse digital beamforming (DBF) to track a UAV’s transmitted signal is described in this thesis. The RSNS is used as the direction finding (DF) algorithm and can provide high angle resolution with two closely spaced elements. However, as is typical for an array, the angle accuracy is reduced at the two ends of the field-of-view (FOV). The monopulse DBF is used to precisely track the signals. The monopulse tracking technique provides precise angle accuracy within a FOV of approximately ±45. The tracking system is developed in LabView, and the performance of a six-element prototype array is demonstrated by measurement in an anechoic chamber.