ORCA is a platform for building low-cost, flexible, and field-proven radar instruments for the cryosphere. ORCA is the base project for Peregrine, a field-portable ice-penetrating radar UAV, MAPPERR, a multi-frequency radar/radiometer, and EYAS, a bistatic ice-penetrating radar receiver.
This website provides documentation for the ORCA codebase, along with instructions for building each of these open-source instruments.
We also provide general strategies for extending our code to develope radar instruments customized to your research needs.
Software-defined radar code documentation
Our software-defined radar code works with most Ettus USRP software-defined radios. With a few hardware components and one YAML file, you can build an ice-penetrating radar system, customized for your research needs.
Peregrine UAS
Use our guide to build Peregrine, a field-portable fixed-wing UAV equipped with a miniaturized ice-penetrating radar system.
MAPPERR
Use our guide to build MAPPERR, a multi-frequency snowmobile-towed ice-penetrating radar-radiometer system.
ORCA was developed by the Stanford Radio Glaciology Lab. Check out our other cool work here!