A SW Simulator Paradigm for Spaceborne GMTI Performance
Maffei, Marco; Venturini, Roberto
Thales Alenia Space, ITALY

Modern system engineering for Spaceborne Radars (SBRs) relies on a rigorous mathematical analysis and related simulation software (SW) tools as an aid to radar performance prediction as well as to support breadboarding activities. This paper outlines the design paradigm of Thales Alenia Space Italia Software Simulator for Spaceborne Ground Moving Target Indicator (GMTI) Performace in Sea Clutter complying to standard policies of system design and development based on Flexibility, Modularity, Interoperability, and Efficiency. Clearly the Efficacy relies on the core engineering issue which has not been faced completely by the scientific and technical community especially for the technological capabilities of SBRs, the thorough applicability of SBR-GMTI techniques to the marine environment, as well as sea clutter modeling.
More specifically the Simulator Paradigm comprises different subsystems to be flexibly updated in an ever increasing level of detail whereas design efforts indeed are aimed at developing a nonreal-time xml-based message passing scheme among different modules spanning aerospace and electrical engineering fields as well as geophysics. Namely spacecrafts orbital mechanics comprising mission analysis, environmental scenarios comprising both littoral and sea clutter patches, static and dynamic targets, atmospheric boundary conditions, modern radar signals encompassing both coherent and non-coherent pulse trains at relevant operative frequency bands, onboard raw data acquisition and related MTI techniques spanning both Real and Synthetic Aperture paradigms as well as Single Input Single Output (SISO) and Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) diversities. The Simulator Paradigm Specification-on-Performance is based on MTI requirements w.r.t. the Neyman Pearson Optimization Criterion whereas the Measuring-Performance relies on comparing Analytical-Results with Monte-Carlo Simulation Results (wherever possible) as per MTI requirements w.r.t. Decision Theory in terms of Binary Hypothesis Testing. Finally, due to the complexity of analytic models for the electromagnetic (EM) scattering from hydrodynamic surfaces and from complex targets, the Signal Modelling is characterized via a statistical signal processing approach.
Within this framework the aforementioned Simulator Paradigm allows assuming different models to be constrained within expansions and/or improvements of the key subsystems data structures whereas the Simulator Functional Architecture and SW Infrastructure remain the same. Accordingly this paper paves the way for a Standardized SW Simulation Design Methodology for European researchers in SBRs exploiting modern distributed arrays programming on multicore-processors workstations.