A transmission beam control unit 8 changes a main beam direction of a radar transmission beam every predetermined number of transmission periods. A radar transmitting unit Tx transmits a radar transmission signal using the radar transmission beam of which the main beam direction has been changed. In a radar receiving unit Rx, an estimation range selection unit 22 selects an estimation range of the direction of arrival of a reflected wave signal by limiting the estimation range to the approximate transmission beam width on the basis of the transmission beam width of the radar transmission beam and the output from the transmission beam control unit 8 . The direction-of-arrival estimation unit 23 estimates the direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal on the basis of phase information between a plurality of antennas according to the selected range.
1. A radar device, comprising:
a transmission beam control unit configured to output a control signal indicating a main beam direction of a radar transmission beam changing every predetermined number of transmission periods;
a radar transmitting unit configured to transmit a radar transmission signal using the radar transmission beam of which the main beam direction has been changed on the basis of the control signal; and
a radar receiving unit configured to estimate, using a plurality of antenna system processing units that receive a reflected wave signal obtained by reflection of the radar transmission signal from a target, a direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal from the target,
wherein the radar receiving unit includes:
an inter-antenna correlation calculation unit configured to generate phase difference information due to arrangement of receiving antennas on the basis of outputs from the plurality of antenna system processing units;
an estimation range selection unit configured to select an estimation range of the direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal on the basis of the control signal and a transmission beam width of the radar transmission beam; and
a direction-of-arrival estimation unit configured to estimate a direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal from the target on the basis of each output of the inter-antenna correlation calculation unit and the estimation range selection unit.
2. The radar device according to claim 1 ,
wherein the radar receiving unit further includes a direction vector storage unit configured to store a direction vector, which includes information of deviation of amplitude and a phase caused between the plurality of antenna system processing units, for each range of the direction of arrival, and
the direction-of-arrival estimation unit is configured to estimate the direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal using the direction vector including an azimuthal direction of the selected estimation range.
3. The radar device according to claim 1 ,
wherein each of the antenna system processing units includes:
a receiving antenna;
a correlation calculation unit configured to calculate a correlation value between the reflected wave signal received through the receiving antenna and a transmission code included in the radar transmission signal; and
an adder unit configured to add the correlation value a predetermined number of times.
4. The radar device according to claim 1 ,
wherein the estimation range selection unit is configured to output a range of an approximate transmission beam width of the radar transmission beam around the main beam direction of the radar transmission beam, which is output from the transmission beam control unit, as the estimation range of the direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal.
5. The radar device according to claim 2 ,
wherein the direction-of-arrival estimation unit is configured to calculate an evaluation function of the direction of arrival on the basis of the direction vector including the azimuthal direction of the estimation range selected by the estimation range selection unit and a correlation matrix, which is output from the inter-antenna correlation calculation unit as phase difference information due to arrangement of receiving antennas, and estimate the azimuthal direction, in which the evaluation function becomes a maximum value, as the direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal.
6. The radar device according to claim 2 ,
wherein the direction vector storage unit further includes a direction matrix corresponding to the number of targets within the transmission beam width of the radar transmission beam, and
the direction-of-arrival estimation unit is configured to calculate an evaluation function of the direction of arrival on the basis of a correlation matrix output from the inter-antenna correlation calculation unit as phase difference information due to arrangement of receiving antennas, the direction vector including the azimuthal direction of the estimation range selected by the estimation range selection unit, and the direction matrix, and estimate the azimuthal direction, in which the evaluation function becomes a minimum value, as the direction of arrival of the reflected wave signal.
7. The radar device according to claim 5 ,
wherein the radar receiving unit further includes a correction coefficient multiplication unit is configured to store a correction coefficient for correcting a gain difference of the radar transmission beam occurring for each main beam direction, and
the direction-of-arrival estimation unit is configured to calculate the evaluation function using the correction coefficient as an offset value.