A Novel High-Squint Spotlight SAR Raw Data Simulation Scheme in 2-D Frequency Domain

Abstract

Raw data simulation is the front-end work of synthetic aperture radar (SAR), which is of great significance. For high-squint spotlight SAR, the frequency domain simulation algorithm is invalid because of the range-azimuth coupling effect. In order to realize high-squint spotlight SAR raw data simulation in the frequency domain, an algorithm based on coordinate transformation and non-uniform fast Fourier transform (NUFFT) is proposed. This algorithm generates broadside raw data using a two-dimensional (2-D) frequency simulation algorithm; then, coordinate transformation is used by analyzing the characteristics of broadside and high-squint spotlight SAR. After coordinate transformation, NUFFT is carried out to realize the coupling relation in the 2-D frequency domain. Since the coordinate transformation ignores the influence of range walk, the range walk is compensated after NUFFT. As a result, compared with the traditional squint spotlight SAR frequency domain simulation algorithm, the proposed algorithm can improve the accuracy of point and distributed target imaging results, and the efficiency of the proposed algorithm can be significantly improved in contrast the traditional time domain algorithm.