The Apple Car may not be on the market for a while, but a recently published patent application shows how Apple may be embedding a radar system of sorts within the bodywork.
Per AppleInsider:
In Apple’s design, it suggests the use of antennas to transmit a radar beam towards a portion of a field of view, along with a vertical antenna array to receive the bounced-back signal. The receive antenna array can consist of multiple antenna elements grouped into sub-arrays, with each sub-array used to receive scatter signals reflected back at it from a smaller subsection of the field of view. Circuitry is then used to combine the received scatter signals from the antenna array into a combined scatter signal, which is then digitized. A second horizontal receive array performs a similar job, again with sub-arrays and the same process. A signal processor is then used to process the scatter signals from both vertical and horizontal arrays, and to correlate the data from each to give effectively a 3D radar layout.
Thus, a fairly effective radar system, which can be used for navigation, collision avoidance, or any number of useful features.
Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.
Via The Mac Observer, AppleInsider, and the United States Patent and Trademark Office