Multi-criteria Performance Assessment of Adaptive Radar Resources Management: Application to Naval Scenario

Multifunction radars (MFR) must achieve their capability requirements in an increasingly complex environment, populated with diverse and hostile targets (e.g. low RCS, low speed targets in clutter or high speed, ballistic targets) in saturating scenarios (due to e.g. RF interference or threats). These radar systems are increasingly exploiting active electronically scanned array (AESA) technology to dynamically interleave functions. However, the increasing complexity and adaptive nature of MFR radar makes it very difficult to specify their performance in a way which can both deliver the required capability and which can be verified in a cost-effective manner. MFR radars have no longer steady state, but their performances should be specified for different operational scenarios. Addressing the challenges in this area will benefit via better understood requirements which can be more easily interpreted. After definition of FoM (Figures of Merit) for phased array radar operation and performance, we have computed them on benchmark test scenarios of varying complexity. We describe a new methodology to aggregate these metrics to provide a global notation of MFR radar performances.