Multifunction Phased Array R d (MPAR)Radar (MPAR)

John Cho

18 November 2014

Sponsors: Michael Emanuel, FAA Advanced Concepts and Technology Development (ANG-C63)

Distribution Statement A. Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.

This work is sponsored by the Federal Aviation Administration under Air Force Contract #FA8721-05-C-0002. Opinions, interpretations, recommendations and conclusions are those of the author and are not necessarily endorsed by the United States Government.

gy ( )Kurt Hondl, NOAA National Severe Storms Laboratory

MPAR Concept

ASR-8 ASR-9 ASR-11

Terminal AreaWeather

Current Aircraft and Weather Radars

Weather

Aircraft

Ground Based UAS S d A id

Multifunction Phased Array Radar (MPAR)

TDWRAircraft

ASR 8 ASR 9 ASR 11

Long Range Aircraft

Sense and Avoid

Non Cooperative

TDWR

ARSR-3 ARSR-4ARSR-1/2FPSMultifunction

Radar

Non-Cooperative Target

NEXRADLong Range Weather • Has potential to lower cost by

– Reducing number of radar units– Lowering O&M (no moving parts)– Streamlining support

infrastructure

CARSR

• Multiple stove-piped radars• Rotating dish technology

M i d f lif

infrastructure– Simplifying training and logistics– Open systems procurement and

maintenance• Increased performance benefits

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 2JYNC 18 November 2014

• Many nearing end-of-life p

Potential Reductionin Number of Radars

500

600

-34%R

equi

red

300

400

TMPARMPARLegacy

(4-m antenna)(8-m antenna)

-28%

-16%

of R

adar

s R

0

100

200 Legacy

Num

ber

01 2 3 4 5 6FAA Only FAA + NOAA FAA + NOAA

+ Air Force

ASRs + ASRs + ASRs +ASRs + TDWR

ASRs + TDWR + NEXRAD

ASRs + TDWR + NEXRAD + LRRs

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 3JYNC 18 November 2014

Greater potential cost savings if more stakeholders join

TMPAR = Terminal MPARLRR = Long Range Radar

Potential Federal Enterprise Capability Enhancements

Weather Observation andAir Surveillance New User EntrantsWind Farm

Improvements to Current Missions Emerging Needs

Observation and Prediction

Air Surveillance New User EntrantsMitigation

Miti t i P idE t d hi h lit B d t• Mitigates equipage failures to cooperative / dependent aircraft

• Enhanced target

• Provides non-cooperative target positions

• Offers support to avoidance and

• Extends high-quality observation to small and medium airports

• Icing risk identification

• Broad-spectrum clutter suppression

• Improved low altitude target g

acquisition and tracking

– Smaller RCS detection

– Improved clutter

well-clear policies and applications

• Hail identification• Improved forecasts• Longer lead times

for severe weather

gdetection and tracking

• Eliminate weather false-alarms on ATC displays

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 4JYNC 18 November 2014

pperformance warnings

ATC displays

RCS = radar cross section

NextGen Surveillance and Weather Radar Capability (NSWRC)

MPARSingle Function Radar Multifunction High Density

Some Candidate NSWRC Solutions

MPARS band

Single Function Radar(One-to-one legacy

replacement)L, S, and C bands

Multifunction High Density Short Range Radar Network

X band

• Low technical risk• Limited capability to

address operational shortfalls and emerging

• High technical risk– Risk reduction for

weather surveillance by NSF’s CASA program

• High technical risk• High capability

enhancement potentialP t ti l lif l t

Risk reduction required to validate MPAR as viable solution

shortfalls and emerging needs • Near-surface coverage

benefit• Potential life cycle cost

reduction

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 5JYNC 18 November 2014

Risk reduction required to validate MPAR as viable solution

CASA = Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere

Outline

• IntroductionIntroduction

• Notional requirements and design

• Risk reduction activities

• SummarySummary

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 6JYNC 18 November 2014

MPAR Requirements

• “Notional Functional Requirements” jointly being developed by FAA and NOAA mainly based on requirements for current radars

• Requirements added to anticipate emerging needs– Terminal aircraft RCSTerminal aircraft RCS

• Reduced from 1 m2 to 0.25 m2

– Aircraft height estimation accuracy introduced• 500 ft rms (0.25–30 nmi), 1000 ft rms (30–60 nmi), ( ), ( ),

2000 ft rms (60–150 nmi), 3000 ft rms (150–250 nmi)– Wind turbine clutter mitigation

• RCS = 1m2, Pd = 80%, 1000 ft above wind farm– Precipitation volume scan update period

reduced to 60 sec

Requirements still evolving will adapt to stakeholder composition

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 7JYNC 18 November 2014

Requirements still evolving, will adapt to stakeholder composition

Legacy Requirements That Drive MPAR Performance

FunctionMaximum Range for Detection of

1m2 Target

Required Coverage Angular Resolution

Waveform Scan Period

Range Altitude Az El1m Target Range Altitude Az El

Terminal Area Aircraft

Surveillance(ASR-9/11)

55 nmi 60 nmi 25,000' 1.4 5o ~18 pulsesPRI ~ 1 ms 5 sec

En Route Aircraft

Surveillance(ARSR-4)

210 nmi 250 nmi 100,000' 1.4 2.0 ~10 pulsesPRI ~ 3 ms 12 sec

Airport Weather ~70 pulsesAirport Weather(TDWR) 250 nmi 48 nmi 70,000' 1 0.5 ~70 pulses

PRI ~ 0.6 ms >180 sec

Nationwide Weather

(NEXRAD)260 nmi 250 nmi 70,000' 1 1 ~50 pulses

PRI ~ 1 ms >240 sec

• Weather surveillance drives requirements for radar power and aperture size

Ai ft ill d i i t f b t d i it ti

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 8JYNC 18 November 2014

• Aircraft surveillance drives requirements for beam management and revisit time

MIT LL MPAR Concept Design

Two 6 x 2 beam clusters

Aircraft Aircraft SurveillanceSurveillance

Aircraft(up to 24 linear pol beams)

SurveillanceSurveillance

Weather(up to 12 linear pol beams)

Weather Weather SurveillanceSurveillance

Frequency: 2.7 - 2.9 GHzDiameter: 4m & 8mT/R per face: 5,000 / 20,000Beamwidth: 2 / 1° (broadside)A t/ 2 $50k

• Four radiating aperture faces• Antenna beam diversity

- Optimize energy-on-target vs. volume coverage Array cost/m2: $50kPolarization: Dual linear/circularBeam count: > 10 beamsBandwidth: ~3 MHzDuty cycle: 8%

ChallengingChallenging

- High sensitivity vs. rapid scanning

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 9JYNC 18 November 2014

Duty cycle: 8%Peak power: 8W/elementStraightforwardStraightforward

MPAR Adaptive BeamScanning Example

Aircraft SurveillanceAircraft Surveillance

Weather SensingWeather Sensing

Dual Pol Horizon Weather Scan

Single Pol Aircraft and Weather Volume Scan

Single Pol Aircraft Tracking

Dual Pol Weather Tracking

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 10JYNC 18 November 2014

Repeat

Outline

• IntroductionIntroduction

• Notional requirements and design

• Risk reduction activities

• SummarySummary

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 11JYNC 18 November 2014

Key Risk Reduction Activities

• Antenna– Cost– Dual polarization performance for weather– Manufacturability– Calibration and reliability– Asynchronous operation and self-interference

• Back end– Receiver cost– Adaptive multifunctional resource management– Open modular architecture

• Operational• Operational– RF spectrum resource usage– Wind-shear detection performance

Radar mission prioritization

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 12JYNC 18 November 2014

– Radar mission prioritization

MPAR Risk Reduction Timeline

Subarray Ten-Panel Demonstrator

Advanced Technology Demonstrator (ATD)Panel

Portable PlatformFull Scale RadarGen 2 PanelGen 1 PanelFull Scale Radar

Testing

Performance Aircraft and Weather 2 Panel Subarray

-60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60-50

-40

-30

-20

-10

0

Angle (deg)

Ampl

itude

(dB

)

Test and Eval

FY15-17

Performance Assessment

• Quantify polarization • Demonstrate full scale radar

FY 13-15

Mode Development

• Component and board development

2 Panel Subarray

FY 07-11

• Component re-spin

FY 12

Test and Eval

• Digital beam clusters• Verify thermal mgmt• Initial radar testing• Support IARD

• Real time radar backend• Multiple mode processing• Adaptive resource mgmt• Flexible test asset

S t IID

board development• Range testing• Initial cost /

performance data

• Tileable panels• Backplane design• Thermal Design• Range testing

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 13JYNC 18 November 2014

• Support IID

IARD = Investment Analysis Readiness DecisionIID = Initial Investment Decision

MIT LL Government Proof of Concept (GPC) MPAR Antenna Panel

RadiatorT/R ModuleRF Chip Set Beamformer0.180.18”

1.251.25”RF Receive RF Receive ChipChip

RF Transmit RF Transmit ChipChip

High Power High Power AmplifierAmplifier

MPAR panel attributes• 2.7-2.9 GHz operating band• 900 W peak RF transmit power

MPAR Panel

p p• Dual simultaneous receive polarization• Low production cost ($8k per panel)

Low cost and high performance met by

16”16”

g p y• Design for manufacturability• Low cost transmit/receive modules• Scalable aperture design

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 14JYNC 18 November 2014

• Digital subarray architecture

2-Panel Subarray Testing

Test Chamber Measurements Hanscom Field Measurements

Far-field amplitude of Mpar Testing5.nsi

40.00

50.00

40 00

-30.00

-20.00

-10.00

0.00

10.00

20.00

30.00

Elev

atio

n (d

eg)

-60-58-56-54-52-50-48-46-44-42-40-38-36-34-32-30-28-26-24-22-20-18-16-14-12-10-8-6-4-20

-50.00 -40.00 -30.00 -20.00 -10.00 0.00 10.00 20.00 30.00 40.00 50.00

Azimuth (deg)

-50.00

-40.00

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 15JYNC 18 November 2014

Panels are achieving objective performance

10-Panel Portable Demonstrator Array

Operational Parameters

Parameter ValueOperating Band 2.7-2.9 GHzPeak Transmit Power 3.5 kWWeather Sensitivity at 40 km 11 dBZPulse Width 80 µsRx Bandwidth 1.0 MHzReceiver Noise Figure 4.7 dBReceive Noise Floor -109 dBmAntenna Gain (Transmit) 33 dBAntenna Gain (Receive) 31 dB

Azimuth Beamwidth Tx = 2.5°Rx = 3.0

• Provides critical risk reduction data – Digital beam clusters

Polarization propertiesElevation Beamwidth Tx = 6.3°

Rx = 7.4°Array Elements, Total 640 (40 x 16)Array Size (w, h) 2.0 m x 0.8 m

– Polarization properties– Thermal management effectiveness– Initial radar testing

• Fabrication in progress

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 16JYNC 18 November 2014

• Field testing in CY15

Risk Reduction: Path Forward

Advanced Technology Demonstrator (ATD)

T h i l Ri k

User Community Outreach

Technical Risk Reduction

• Dual-pol weatherB lib ti

CONOPS Refinement

• Beam calibration• Adaptive

multifunctionality• Resource

sched ling

To replace NWRT SPY-1A antenna76 panels (4 m x 4 m)Performance

scheduling• Range and

angular sidelobes• Spectrum usage

• Front end: MIT LL GPC panels• Back end: Leverage Navy’s

ACRA program (tentative)

Requirements Development

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 17JYNC 18 November 2014

ACRA = Affordable Common Radar ArchitectureNWRT = National Weather Radar Testbed (Norman, OK)

Joint funding by NOAA and FAA

Summary

• MPAR is a potentially cost-effective and enhanced-performance solution for NextGen Surveillance and Weather Radar Capability (NSWRC)

• MIT LL has developed a conceptual MPAR system based on legacy and emerging observation needslegacy and emerging observation needs

• Next steps: Build and test Advanced Technology DemonstratorNext steps: Build and test Advanced Technology Demonstrator to further mitigate technical risk and refine system requirements

Lincoln Laboratory Air Traffic Control Workshop 2014MPAR - 18JYNC 18 November 2014