A Passive Radar Prototype Based on Multi-channel Joint Detection and Its Test Results

Passive radar has shown many advantages as compared to active radar. However, it also faces more challenge owing to the weak signal for detection, especially when using GEO satellite signals as illuminator of opportunity (IO), and high processing gain is then required. In this paper, a radar prototype using the standard digital television signals of Digital Video Broadcast-Satellite (DVB-S) as IO is developed, which applies cross-correlation over three broadcasting channels of Apstar-6 simultaneously and jointly. Experiments are conducted to test performance of the prototype.