An apparatus for resolving velocity ambiguity in a MIMO RADAR includes a plurality of transmit channels and a virtual channel Each transmit channel includes a transmit antenna configured to transmit a plurality of chirps. Each chirp includes a frequency ramp of a transmit frequency of the respective transmit channel. Each transmit channel is orthogonal to another transmit channel and to a virtual transmit channel. A waveform generator is configured to generate a local oscillator (LO) signal for each transmit channel. A frequency offset circuit is configured to modify the LO signal of each transmit channel with a respective frequency offset to generate the respective transmit frequency.

A computer implemented method for detecting objects includes providing signal representation data comprising range information, velocity information and angular information; for each of a plurality of spatial scales, determining respective scaled data for the respective spatial scale based on the signal representation data, to obtain a plurality of scaled data; providing the plurality of scaled data to a plurality of detectors; and each detector carrying out object detection based on at least one of the plurality of scaled data.

A radar sensing system for a vehicle includes transmitters, receivers, a memory, and a processor. The transmitters transmit radio signals and the receivers receive reflected radio signals. The processor produces samples by correlating reflected radio signals with time-delayed replicas of transmitted radio signals. The processor stores this information as a first radar data cube (RDC), with information related to signals reflected from objects as a function of time (one of the dimensions) at various distances (a second dimension) for various receivers (a third dimension). The first RDC is processed to compute velocity and angle estimates, which are stored in a second RDC and a third RDC, respectively. One or more memory optimizations are used to increase performance. Before storing the second RDC and the third RDC in an internal/external memory, the second and third RDCs are sparsified to only include the outputs in specific regions of interest.

A radar sensing system for a vehicle includes transmitters, receivers, a memory, and a processor. The transmitters transmit radio signals and the receivers receive reflected radio signals. The processor produces samples by correlating reflected radio signals with time-delayed replicas of transmitted radio signals. The processor stores this information as a first radar data cube (RDC), with information related to signals reflected from objects as a function of time (one of the dimensions) at various distances (a second dimension) for various receivers (a third dimension). The first RDC is processed to compute velocity and angle estimates, which are stored in a second RDC and a third RDC, respectively. One or more memory optimizations are used to increase performance. Before storing the second RDC and the third RDC in an internal/external memory, the second and third RDCs are sparsified to only include the outputs in specific regions of interest.

In an azimuth estimation device, a center generation unit configured to generate, for each peak bin extracted by the extraction unit, a center matrix which is a correlation matrix obtained using values of the same peak bin collected from all of transmitting/receiving channels. A surrounding generation unit is configured to generate, for each of one or more surrounding bins of each of the peak bins, a surrounding matrix which is a correlation matrix obtained using values of the same surrounding bin collected from all of the transmitting/receiving channels. An integration unit is configured to generate, for each peak bin, an integrated matrix which is a correlation matrix obtained by weighting and adding the center matrix and the one or more surrounding matrices. An estimation unit is configured to execute an azimuth estimation calculation using the integrated matrix generated by the integration unit.

An embodiment method includes: receiving radar data at a millimeter-wave radar sensor, the radar data being generated in response to an incident radio-frequency signal reflecting off an object located in a field of view of the millimeter-wave radar sensor; filtering the radar data to generate a first-filtered signal; determining a trajectory of motion corresponding to the first-filtered signal; and determining whether the trajectory of motion corresponds to a human signature, the human signature being associated with a respective operation of a vehicle.

An embodiment method includes: receiving radar data at a millimeter-wave radar sensor, the radar data being generated in response to an incident radio-frequency signal reflecting off an object located in a field of view of the millimeter-wave radar sensor; filtering the radar data to generate a first-filtered signal; determining a trajectory of motion corresponding to the first-filtered signal; and determining whether the trajectory of motion corresponds to a human signature, the human signature being associated with a respective operation of a vehicle.

A radar sensing system for a vehicle has multiple transmitters and receivers on a vehicle. The transmitters are configured to transmit radio signals which are reflected off of objects in the environment. There are one or more receivers that receive the reflected radio signals. Each receiver has an antenna, a radio frequency front end, an analog-to-digital converter (ADC), and a digital signal processor. The transmitted signals are based on spreading codes generated by a programmable code generation unit. The receiver also makes use of the spreading codes generated by the programmable code generation unit. The programmable code generation unit is configured to selectively generate particular spreading codes that have desired properties.

A radar sensing system for a vehicle has multiple transmitters and receivers on a vehicle. The transmitters are configured to transmit radio signals which are reflected off of objects in the environment. There are one or more receivers that receive the reflected radio signals. Each receiver has an antenna, a radio frequency front end, an analog-to-digital converter (ADC), and a digital signal processor. The transmitted signals are based on spreading codes generated by a programmable code generation unit. The receiver also makes use of the spreading codes generated by the programmable code generation unit. The programmable code generation unit is configured to selectively generate particular spreading codes that have desired properties.

A multichannel radar system comprising a set of antennas each receiving a sequence of chirps reflected from plurality of objects, a range detector generating a set of range bins for each chirp, a beam former operative to generate a set of dominant frequency components from a group of range bins picked from the set of range bins across the set of antennas, a nearness detector for separating the set of dominant frequencies into a first set of dominant frequencies and a second set of dominant frequencies, a frequency subtractor configured to shift the each dominant frequency in the first set of dominant frequencies by its phase by a first value to form a third set of phase shifted dominant frequencies, and a Doppler estimator estimating a Doppler frequency of the each dominant frequency in the set of dominant frequencies from the third set of phase shifted dominant frequencies and the second set of dominant frequencies.