A reconfigurable stepped frequency GPR (GPR-R)

Abstract

Ground Penetrating Radars are a unique and well known tool for soil investigation. In order to improve its penetration depth and/or its resolution limits, in the past several radar designs, based on the so called Continuous Wave-Stepped Frequency technique have been proposed. However, the resulting design was often a quite complex equipment. The radar system prototype proposed in this paper, while exhibits state of the art performances with a contained hardware size, it explores a new horizon applicable only to the CW-SF radar technique: the radar reconfigurability (GPR-R).