Investigation and experiment of radar systems in unmanned aerial vehicles - I

Abstract

With the rapid improvement of technologies, many organisations have been upgrading themselves to keep up with the advancements of technologies. This applies to the military world as well. Some key aspects of the current military technology are the usage of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). SAR is used to capture high resolution images as well as moving target detection under various weather conditions.

Nanyang Technological University is conducting a research topic on operating a SAR, which will be mounted onto an UAV. Investigation from system perspective will be done, as well as the key parameters and effects will be studied.

This project covers on the production of a super high frequency (SHF) output of 11.82GHz, which is essential for the initial phase of the SAR production. For this project, three main components are used, namely KC705 Evaluation Board for Kintex-7 FPGA, Arduino Mega 2560 and HMC-783 Phase Lock Loop (PLL) Board.

This report will focus mainly on the usage of HMC-783 PLL Board and how it is being integrated with other components to produce the desired output frequency.