If you were tired of watching weather reports on the TV and feeling jealous that you could never become a weatherman or weatherwoman yourself, read on.
MIT has announced its three-week undergraduate lab course “Build a Small Radar System Capable of Sensing Range, Doppler, and Synthetic Aperture Radar Imaging.” for the public, for free. It is part of MIT’s Open Course Software Program. It teaches you how to build your own personal Doppler radar with just coffee cans. Sounds interesting, but if you thought it is going to be as easy as drinking a cup of coffee, it is not.
It will teach you basics of applied electromagnetics, RF, analog, signal processing and other technical topics that higher degree engineering students learn in their awesome technical schools. At the end of the course, you will be able to build your own innocuous-looking Doppler radar right on your coffee table.
Only, it may not be great at forecasting storms and hurricanes, but will definitely perform as an improvised “radar gun”. It could be a great way to spend a fortnight at home without doing much but driving yourself crazy over all the theories of engineering. If you are sick and tired of listening to all these really tech-sounding terms, go get yourself a Lego Radar Ring, and visit the nearest mall to chill out.
