Technical Solutions for Automotive Intermodulation Radar for Detecting Vulnerable Road Users

This paper presents building blocks for a proposed automotive intermodulation radar for detecting and identifying vulnerable road users (VRUs). The intermodulation radar transmits at two frequencies and it has receivers both for normal reflections and for reflections from VRUs at the intermodulation frequency. A possible radar architecture is presented and modulation techniques are discussed. Different mixing elements of radar reflectors are studied with simulations. An antenna structure enabling a wearable reflector that can be integrated into clothes is designed and characterized. The simulated and measured performance of the radar reflector is used to estimate the achievable detection range.