A Pulse Compression Waveform for Improved-Sensitivity Weather Radar Observations

The progression of phased array weather observations, research, and planning over the past decade has led to significant advances in development efforts for future weather radar technologies. However, numerous challenges still remain for large-scale deployment. The eventual goal for phased array weather radar technology includes the use of active arrays, where each element would have its own transmit/receive module. This would lead to significant advantages; however, such a design must be capable of utilizing low-power, solid-state transmitters at each element in order to keep costs down. To provide acceptable sensitivity, as well as the range resolution needed for weather observations, pulse compression strategies are required. Pulse compression has been used for decades in military applications, but it has yet to be applied on a broad scale to weather radar, partly because of concerns regarding sensitivity loss caused by pulse windowing. A robust optimization technique for pulse compression waveforms with minimalistic windowing using a genetic algorithm is presented. A continuous nonlinear frequency-modulated waveform that takes into account transmitter distortion is shown, both in theory and in practical use scenarios. Measured pulses and weather observations from the Advanced Radar Research Center’s dual-polarized PX-1000 transportable radar, which utilizes dual 100-W solid-state transmitters, are presented. Both stratiform and convective scenarios, as well as dual-polarization observations, are shown, demonstrating significant improvement in sensitivity over previous pulse compression methods.