Methods for classifying objects in automotive-grade radar signals

A radar system, comprising:

• a transmitter configured to transmit radar signals;
• a receiver configured to receive radar signals reflected from objects in a field of view;
• a signal processor configured to:
• form a three-dimensional range-angle-velocity cube from the received radar signals, the three-dimensional range-angle-velocity cube including individual bins with radar intensity values characterizing angle and range for a specific velocity;
• select point-pillar sub-cubes from the three-dimensional range-angle-velocity cube, each point-pillar sub-cube including a region surrounding a high energy peak in range-angle dimensions and an entire range in a velocity vector;
• and
• process the point-pillar sub-cubes to compress, decompress, detect, classify or track objects in the field of view including:
• compressing velocity data in the point-pillar sub-cubes using one or more of a neural network or a pointwise operator before applying a classifier;
• and
• reconstructing uncompressed velocity data in the point-pillar sub-cubes.