Waveform Design for FMCW MIMO Radar Based on

Frequency Division

Alex Zwanetski, Matthias Kronauge, Hermann Rohling

Institute of Telecommunications
Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH)
Hamburg, Germany
zwanetski@et2.tu-harburg.de, kronauge@et2.tu-harburg.de, rohling@tu-harburg.de

Abstract: Classical radar systems can achieve the angular resolution based on linear
phased array antenna technology. If a high angular resolution is required a large an-
tenna aperture is needed. In case of a single transmitter (TX) the number 𝑁 of receive
antenna elements corresponds directly to the number of targets that may be separated and
resolved by their different azimuth angle positions. The spacing between two adjacent re-
ceive antenna elements inside a uniform array determines the maximum unambiguous
azimuth observation area. Therefore the antenna aperture is defined by the required an-
gular resolution and the maximum unambiguous azimuth observation area.
However, the angular resolution of a radar system can be increased dramatically by
using multiple transmit antennas. Each transmitter generates an individual signal that
can be clearly distinguished inside the different radar receivers (RX). This Multiple In-
put Multiple Output (MIMO) technology shifts some of the computation complexity from
the receive antenna array into the transmitter side. For the special case of two transmit
antennas and an arbitrary number of receive antenna elements a Frequency Modulated
Continuous Wave (FMCW) signal is proposed in this paper. In this case the angular
resolution of the radar system is improved by the factor of two compared to the same
configuration with a single transmit antenna.

1. Introduction
Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) radar systems have got much attention in the last years.
This is a very promising technique with high performance figures. A MIMO radar system con-
sisting of several transmit antennas (TX) provides a significantly higher angular resolution than
a Single Input Multiple Output (SIMO) radar with a number of receive antennas 𝑁 . The main
technical challenge for a MIMO radar system is to develop suitable transmit signals that can
be unambiguously separated at each receive antenna (RX). Basically there are three techniques
to achieve the complete signal separation: time, code and frequency division. While the time
division multiplex (TDM) provides a serial transmission, code (CDM) and frequency (FDM)
division techniques require a set of orthogonal signals that can be simultaneously transmitted.

A classical Frequency Modulated Continuous Wave (FMCW) transmit signal based on a chirp
sequence with short chirp duration 𝑇chirp , as shown in Fig. 1, is considered in this paper to
measure target range and radial velocity simultaneously even in multiple target situations [1, 2].
 transmit signal
𝜏 receive signal
𝑓 (𝑡)

𝑓sw 𝑓B …

𝑓0
~
~
𝑡
𝑇chirp
Figure 1: Classical FMCW transmit signal based on a chirp sequence

Several radar systems which are based on the FMCW transmit signal have been studied and ap-
plied in the last years. The chirp sequence waveform has the advantage to measure and to resolve
target echo signals simultaneously in range and Doppler frequency direction. This waveform has
been applied successfully in different applications, like automotive radar or HF-radar [2, 3, 4]
for ship detection or even Tsunami recognition.

There is one important point to consider in the system design regarding the chirp duration. A
short duration of a single chirp 𝑇chirp has the characteristic of always negative beat-frequencies
𝑓B in the receive (RX) channel [1]. Consequently a single channel receiver with inphase com-
ponent only is required in this case, which reduces the hardware complexity of the radar sensor.
This is an additional strong advantage for the chirp sequence waveform.

The echo signal is in this case down-converted with the instantaneous carrier frequency into
base band. The real valued (inphase) base band signal is FFT processed to measure the beat
frequency 𝑓𝐵 . The target range 𝑅 is finally estimated by the measured beat frequency 𝑓𝐵 and
the related propagation delay 𝜏 . The target range 𝑅 estimation is described in (1).
𝑐 𝑐 𝑓B
𝑅= ⋅𝜏 = ⋅ 𝑇chirp , (1)
2 2 𝑓sw
where 𝑐 describes the speed of light and 𝑇chirp , 𝑓sw are the waveform parameters chirp duration
and signal bandwidth respectively.

TX RX1 RX2 RX3 … RX8

𝜆
2
Figure 2: Phased array with eight receive antennas

If this chirp sequence transmit signal is combined with a phased array antenna then additional
resolution in azimuth angle is feasible. A radar target can be measured and resolved in range,
radial velocity and azimuth angle. Such a phase array is depicted in Fig. 2.
2. MIMO Radar System Design

A MIMO radar system is characterised by multiple transmit and multiple receive antennas. Each
receiver has in this case to distinguish between the different transmit signals which are trans-
mitted simultaneously. Therefore this paper considers a MIMO radar system with two transmit
antennas and introduces a specific FDM waveform for these two TX. Both TX transmit a well
known FMCW transmit signal based on a chirp sequence with the same small chirp duration
𝑇𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑟𝑝 and the same bandwidth as described in Fig. 1. Therefore, each transmit signal has a con-
stant envelope. However, the FMCW transmit signals of the two transmitters are shifted by 𝑓shift
on the frequency axis, as shown in Fig. 4. Each receiver can in this case distinguish between the
two transmitted waveforms.

The antenna configuration for the special case of two transmit antennas is depicted in Fig. 3.
The corresponding virtual array is given by the pairwise summation of the transmit and receive
antenna positions [5]. It describes the equivalent phased array radar with the same angular
resolution and measurement performance however with a much higher computation complexity.

TX1 RX1 RX2 RX3 … RX8 TX2

𝜆 𝜆
4 𝜆 4
2

virtual elements

Figure 3: MIMO array with eight receive and two transmit antennas

Comparing this virtual array to the SIMO array depicted in Fig. 2, a clear performance im-
provement can be observed that occurs if one more transmit antenna is integrated into the radar
system. Due to the extended aperture in the virtual array the corresponding MIMO system pro-
vides twice as high angular resolution compared with the SIMO system.

To ensure an unambiguous separation of the two transmit signals at the receiver side the fre-
quency shift has to be larger than the highest occurring beat-frequency:

𝑓shift > 𝑓B, max . (2)

It is important to notice that at each receiver RX𝑛 side the echo signal is down-converted by the
instantaneous transmit frequency of the first transmitter TX1 . This means there will be small
and larger beat frequencies 𝑓𝐵 observed in each receiver. The resulting spectrum consists in
this case of two parts, which have nearly the same magnitude however with different phases.
This phase difference contains the information about target azimuth angle positions and is used
to develop and apply virtual signals. Due to the specific FMCW waveform the receive signal
(1) (2)
contains two beat frequencies 𝑓B and 𝑓B for each target.
 transmit signal
𝜏 receive signal
𝑓 (𝑡)
TX1
(1)
𝑓sw 𝑓B …
TX2
(2)
𝑓0 𝑓B

𝑓shift
~
~
𝑡
𝑇chirp
Figure 4: FMCW chirp sequence for TX1 and TX2

∣𝐻(𝑓B )∣
TX2 TX1

−2𝑓shift −𝑓shift 𝑓B
(2) (1)
𝑓B 𝑓B

Figure 5: Spectrum of the receive signal in a multiple target situation

The beat-frequency 𝑓𝐵 caused by the signal from the first transmitter TX1 is given, as in the
SIMO case [1, 2], by the target range 𝑅 and its radial velocity 𝑣R :
(1) 𝑓sweep 2 2
𝑓B = − 𝑅 − 𝑣R , (3)
𝑇chirp 𝑐 𝜆 
 
  
𝑓R 𝑓D

where 𝑓R is a frequency component based on a pure target range contribution to the beat fre-
quency and 𝑓D is the radial velocity dependent Doppler frequency in the radar echo signal. The
waveform and system parameter 𝑓sweep , 𝑇chirp , 𝜆 and 𝑐 describe the signal bandwidth, chirp du-
ration, wave length and the speed of light respectively. Due to the short chirp duration the first
component 𝑓R dominates always the beat frequency 𝑓𝐵 measurement and since 𝑅 > 0 the beat
(2)
frequency is always negative. The beat-frequency 𝑓B is just shifted by 𝑓shift on the frequency
axis:
(2) (1)
𝑓B = 𝑓B − 𝑓shift . (4)

From a signal processing point of view the down-converted baseband signal is chirp-wise
Fourier transformed applying the FFT algorithm, as shown in Fig. 6.

A second FFT is applied range gate specifically to measure the Doppler frequency. In this case
the target range and radial velocity are measured unambiguously and simultaneously even in
 𝑓 (𝑡)
…

~
~
𝑡
FFT FFT FFT
𝑓D
FFT
(1) FFT 𝑓B
𝑓B FFT TX1
𝑓shift

…
(2)
𝑓B
TX2
FFT
FFT
𝑓B
range-Doppler matrix

Figure 6: Signal Processing for a MIMO radar system and separation between the two TX signals

multiple target situations. The measurement results are stored in a range-Doppler matrix, as
depicted in Fig. 6. With the two transmit antennas there are two echo signal measured for each
TX signal separately. This additional information will be used to develop the virtual array. The
final step in the signal processing chain is a beamforming scheme that provides high angular
resolution.

One of the main advantages of a MIMO radar system is that the angular resolution can be
extremely increased by the concept of a virtual array. For the general case considering a MIMO
system with 𝑀 transmit and 𝑁 receive antennas its virtual array consist of 𝑀 ⋅ 𝑁 elements.
From the performance point of view, this virtual array corresponds to a SIMO system with a
single TX and 𝑀 ⋅ 𝑁 receive antennas, so that the same angle resolution can be achieved [6].

𝑛
g

𝑓D
in
rm
fo
am

𝑓B
TX2
Be

TX1

Figure 7: Virtual array for two TX and eight RX channels

With the proposed technique the TX specific echo signal separation in the resulting range-
Doppler matrix (RDM) can be done by a split of the three-dimensional RDM into two parts.
That part of the spectrum with small beat frequencies 𝑓𝐵 belongs to the first transmit antenna
TX1 and the larger beat frequencies can be assigned to the second transmit antenna TX2 . The
virtual array is constructed due to the suggested MIMO antenna configuration as depicted in
Fig. 7. Finally a high resolution beamforming is processed over the set of resulted virtual sig-
nals.

3. Conclusions
This paper presents a special FMCW radar waveform for a MIMO system with two TX and
eight RX channels. It allows a simultaneous range, Doppler frequency and azimuth angle mea-
surement even in multiple target situations and provides a high angular resolution compared and
related to a SIMO system with a single transmit antenna. The TX specific echo signal separation
is based on FDM principle. Both FMCW signals transmitted from different TX are identical in
chirp duration and signal bandwidth. There is just a short frequency shift between the two TX
signals. The frequency shift has been chosen in such a way that the signal separation at the
receiver side can be processed in a simple way, just by splitting the measured range-Doppler
matrix (RDM) into two parts. The resulting RDM are merged to a virtual array with 16 virtual
antenna elements. This result provides a basis for a high resolution azimuth angle measurement
with a significant improvement of the angle measurement performance in comparison to a clas-
sical SIMO technique with a single TX and a phased array. It has been shown that with a quite
low additional technical effort the angular resolution can be increased by the factor of two.

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