Advances in radar technology have produced a new family of threats. Unconventional waveforms such as spread spectrum and very short pulses are combined with strategies of power management. These new types of signals call for an advance in shipboard electronic support measure (EMS) receivers. This study will define the performance versus cost tradeoffs of various receiver architectures. The study will include advanced component and subsystem technology such as mimic, GAAS, DrfM LSI, acousto-optics, compressive techniques, and multidimensional techniques such as azimuth vs frequency. This study is comprised of five tasks which are: I) select postulated threat signals and environments, 2) define receiver functions against these signals, 3) specify receiver architectures to implement these functions, 4) access implementing technologies, and 5) perform a cost, risk, performance tradeoff. This Phase I study would provide the foundation for the development of an advanced shipboard ESM system to detect and determine the direction of arrival of unconventional radar signals. The result of this project would be identification of ESM receiver architectures and implementing technologies, and a tradeoff analysis that maximizes performance versus development cost and risk.
