SEA CLUTTER SIMULATION AND COMPARATIVE STUDY OF EFFECTS IN RADAR IMAGERY

Abstract: Good knowledge of clutter statistical characteristics is required to design high-performance detection algorithms. Sea clutter is a special case, because of its very particular distribution and correlation laws. Furthermore, for high-resolution radars, usually used for radar imagery tasks, sea clutter is difficult to characterize, especially for low grazing angles. A phenomenological model of sea clutter, discussed in this paper, allows estimating sea clutter probability density function. The echo signal is best described as the product of a Gaussian process, with rapid variation (the speckle component), and of a slow varying component (the underlying component). Statistical distribution which provides the best fitting is the K-compound distribution. Afterwards, it is used to conceive a sea clutter simulation tool, output of which is used to corrupt synthetic target complex signatures. Then, imagery methods (Fourier 2D and MUSIC 2D algorithms) are used to reconstruct target ISAR images. A comparative study of their relative robustness is performed, showing that superresolution methods provide better performance