Investigating the IEEE 802.11ad Standard for Millimeter Wave Automotive Radar

TLDR

Millimeter‑wave technology is widely used in automotive radar for functions such as adaptive cruise control and obstacle detection. This study investigates using a consumer IEEE 802.11ad WLAN waveform at 60 GHz to create a joint long‑range radar and vehicle‑to‑vehicle communication framework that exploits the data‑aided Golay complementary sequences of the SCPHY frame. The framework applies standard WLAN receiver algorithms for time and frequency synchronization to estimate radar parameters from the SCPHY frame. Simulations demonstrate that the SCPHY preamble can deliver 0.1 m range accuracy with over 99 % detection probability, while velocity can be estimated to 0.1 m/s accuracy at high SNR using a single frame’s preamble and pilot words.

Abstract

Millimeter wave (mmWave) technology is widely used for automotive radar applications, like adaptive cruise control and obstacle detection. Unlike conventional radar waveforms which are usually propriety, this paper explores the use of a consumer wireless local area network (WLAN) waveform in the 60GHz unlicensed mmWave band for automotive radar applications. In particular, this paper develops a joint framework of long range automotive radar (LRR) and vehicle-to-vehicle communication (V2V) at 60 GHz by exploiting the special data-aided structure (repeated Golay complimentary sequences) of an IEEE 802.11ad single carrier physical layer (SCPHY) frame. This framework leverages the signal processing algorithms used in the typical WLAN receiver for time and frequency synchronization to perform radar parameter estimation. The initial simulation results show that it is possible to achieve the desired range accuracy of 0.1 m with a very high probability of detection (above 99%) using the preamble of a SCPHY frame. Furthermore, the velocity estimation algorithm achieves the desired accuracy of 0.1 m/s at high SNR using the preamble and pilot words of only a single frame.