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Welcome to the CUPRI Home Page

(Cornell University Portable Radar Interferometer)

The CUPRI systems are portable 50-MHz radars, one contained in a Winnebago Motor Home and the other in the back of a former UHaul truck. Each has a Harris computer that controls the data acquisition, graphical displays, and recording. The transmitter can output up to 50 kW of peak power using a variety of pulsing schemes that are under computer control via the Timing Unit. Pulse lengths from 1 us to 150 us are possible. Coding schemes include both complementary and Barker. The system has three receivers to implement the radar interferometer modes that are typically used. The transmitting antennas are multiple COCO (co-linear co-axial) strings of half-wavelength dipoles. The multiple receiving antennas include the transmitting COCO array as well as other COCO arrays and/or Yagi arrays. Sampling is done via multiple ADCs. The entire system is shipped inside the van and upon arrival at a site, the antennas (and poles or towers) are unloaded and erected. The radar system was designed and built by Dr. Wesley Swartz and a number of his students. Dr. Swartz is a member of the Space Plasma Physics Research Group, which is part of the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University. The CUPRI project has received support from the National Science Foundation under Grants ATM-9406140, and ATM-9713575.

Current CUPRI status.

	CUPRI in Alcantara, Brazil for the NASA Guara Dip-Equator Campaign. The radar is operated from the rear of the air conditioned U-Haul van, shown next to one of the power stations for the Brazilian rocket range. Also shown are the two large COCO antenna arrays (foreground) and the Yagi array (top right). Click on image for full screen view.
	The Winnebago version of CUPRI shown at Lycksele, Sweden. A dual COCO array was strung on top of the tall towers to produce a low elevation beam that was directed over the EISCAT facility near Tromso, Norway.
	Wes Swartz pausing during CUPRI operations in Isabela, PR. This was just one of many locations used for CUPRI experiments.
	A typical CUPRI crew (left to right: W. Swartz, D. Riggin, and J. Providakes) posing in front of some icebergs from nearby glacier activity at Narsarsuaq, Greenland. Since it is portable, the radar and its crew have visited a number of interesting and exotic locales as part of international campaigns.
	A recent CUPRI PhD. with his committee (left to right: C. Seyler, Dr. J. Rosado-Roman, M. Kelley, D. Farley, and W. Swartz).

Further Information

Detailed CUPRI Photos
CUPRI Campaigns/Affiliated Radar Sites
Incoherent Scatter Radar Map
Upper Atmospheric Studies at Cornell University

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Direct comments or suggestions to Wes Swartz.
Last modified on 01/8/31.
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This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. ATM-0075241. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

Initial design by Mike Kranz and Mark Krangle 97/11/17.