  This work studies the problem of radar detection of correlated
gamma-fluctuating targets in the presence of clutter described by compound
models with correlated speckle. If the correlation is not accounted for in a
radar model, the required signal-to-interference ratio for a given probability
of detection will be incorrect, resulting in over-estimated performance.
Although more generally applicable, the is focus on airborne maritime radar
systems. Hence K-distributed sea clutter is used as the main example. Detection
via square-law non-coherent pulse integration is formulated in a way that
accommodates arbitrary partial correlation for both target radar cross-section
(RCS) and clutter speckle. The obstacle to including this degree of generality
in previous work was the fact that Swerling's original characterization of the
standard RCS fluctuation classes as gamma distributions for the power is not
sufficient for the inclusion of both correlation sources (i.e.target and
clutter speckle) for gamma-fluctuating targets. An extension of the model is
required at the quadrature component (i.e. voltage) level, as phase
relationships can no longer be neglected. This is addressed in the present
work, which not only postulates an extended model, but also demonstrates how to
efficiently compute it, with and without a number of simplifying approximation
schemes within the framework of the saddle-point technique.

Signal Processing