Blue Team 2017
3D SAR UAV
Traditional synthetic aperture radar imaging requires significant cost and resources, and is typically performed by large aircraft where precise location data is difficult to obtain. In this Tufts University Senior Design project, an accurate and low-cost method of obtaining and generating 3D synthetic aperture radar images was investigated. Using a PulsON P410 monostatic radar, a Piksi differential GPS system and a Hummingboard microcontroller, location and synthetic aperture radar data was obtained using a DJI S900 UAV platform, and voxels, or pixels that incorporate 3-dimensinoal location data, were generated to form images. The location data incorporated in 3D voxels reduce the distortion and inaccuracies found in conventional 2-dimensional synthetic aperture radar images. Since this is an ongoing senior design project, the main goal this year was to improve the sharpness and detail in the 3D images created. Methods to obtain accurate timing synchronization between the radar and GPS data were investigated, and a variety of image processing techniques were incorporated to improve image resolution and increase processing speed.
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Blue Team Project Poster
