Enabling digital beamforming techniques for rf systems having short repetitive synchronization sequences

Abstract

A system and method of enabling digital beamforming (DBF) for use with RF receiver systems with a multi-element array antenna having short repetitive synchronizaton sequences in a noise and/or jamming environment. The method includes the following steps: a) receiving repetitive synchronization RF signals utilizing a multi-element array antenna, each of the repetitive synchronization RF signals includes an ideal known synchronization sequence, the ideal known synchronization sequence is denoted as yand a length of the ideal known synchronization sequence is denoted as N; b) calculating a sequence of magnitudes and phases for each element of the multi-element array antenna corresponding to each of the ideal known synchronization sequences in the received synchronization RF signals, the sequence of the magnitudes and the phases comprises an array of N elements and is denoted as x, wherein the phases are also referred to as absolute phases; c) calculating a relative phase for each element in the sequence of the magnitudes and the absolute phases by referencing the absolute phases of all elements in the array x of N elements to a phase of a single element in the array x of N elements; d) converting the array x of N elements with the magnitudes and the absolute phases into an array of N elements with the magnitudes and the relative phases by replacing each of the absolute phases in the array x of N elements with the calculated relative phase for each element, the array of N elements with the magnitudes and the relative phases is denoted as x; e) calculating a relative cross correlation vector for each element of the multi-element array antenna utilizing xand y, the relative cross correlation vector is denoted as r, where r=E{xy*} and * is a complex conjugate; and, f) generating a relative cross correlation vector estimate by filtering r, for use with DBF techniques.