X-Band Demonstrator for Receive-only Frontend with Digital Beamforming

Inhalt:
A technology demonstration has shown feasibility of the scan-on-receive (SCORE) principle in X-band, required for future High-Resolution Wide-Swath (HRWS) SAR instruments. Under ESA contract, a hardware demonstrator has been designed, built and tested. The 5-channel demonstrator features homodyne downconversion, early digitization, and digital beamforming (DBF). Digital beamforming is performed in real-time and has successfully been demonstrated in the anechoic chamber. Achieved performances are reported, including receive chain noise figure, SNR beamforming gain and DC power consumption.