An imaging
millimeter wave radar system. The
system includes a
millimeter wave
transmitter transmitting a frequency scanned
millimeter beam that is narrow in the scanned direction and wide in a direction perpendicular to the scanned direction. The
system includes a receive antenna and a Rotman type lens for forming a one-dimensional image in the
perpendicular direction of targets in the antennas
field of view based on millimeter wave
radiation reflected from the targets. A computer creates a two dimensional
image based on the scanning direction of the transmit beam of the transmit antenna and the one dimensional image from the receive antenna. Distance to the target is determined based on difference in frequency of the transmit
signal and the receive
signal. Thus, a three dimensional view of the systems
field of view is determined by the system. This view can be displayed on a monitor using color to represent target distance. In a preferred embodiment the scanned direction is the vertical direction and the receive antenna forms a horizontal image from signals reflected from targets in the
field of view. In this preferred embodiment the transmit antenna is a variable frequency millimeter wave single channel wave guide antenna operating in the 78 GHz to 81 Ghz spectral range to produce a scanning range of 10 degrees and a scanning rate of 60 Hz. The receive antenna is a multi-channel (176 channels) strip-line antenna also operating in the 78 GHz to 81 GHz spectral range, which with the Rotman lens, provides 192 horizontal pixel resolution.