A Novel Photonic Beam-Space Receiver For Multi-Function Radar

A novel photonic beam-former concept is discussed within the context of traditional Radar design considerations. The beam-former concept has been proven for passive imaging applications1; however, the work presented herein discusses extension of the theory to an active sensing problem space. The paper concentrates on discussion of photonic beamspace beam-forming and its relation to existing Beam-Space array theory and closes with several observations of the application of the photonic beam-space receiver to a simulated radar scenario. The initial results presented highlight the photonic beam-former's ability to generate a full beam space for an arbitrary array size in real-time.