Low-cost radar could help visually impaired

Developed by a team at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) and VTT Technical Research Center, the radar is said to provide detailed information about the size, distance and speed of moving objects. However, for close-range applications, the transmitted radio waves must have short wavelengths to pick up as much detail as possible about its immediate environment. Such sensors could help visually impaired people by translating radar reflections into useful information.

“Current radar modules are large and bulky. They also lose out on key details because they operate using long radio wavelengths,” said Seifallah Jardak, who worked on the project under the supervision of Sajid Ahmed and Mohamed-Slim Alouini from KAUST and along with Tero Kiuru and Mikko Metso from VTT. “We wanted to develop a low-power, portable radar. Colleagues at VTT brought the necessary experience in millimetre-wave and hardware design, while I focused on the signal processing side and developed modular radar software.”