I built a mmWave material classification radar
Summary
An inventor describes building a mmWave radar to classify materials, using TI IWRL6432, ESP32, Capon beamforming, and a CNN to extract material signatures from the DSP output. The piece covers the signal processing chain, simulated and measured results, and a proof-of-concept for asbestos detection, as well as open-source tools like OpenEMS. It ends with hard lessons about hardware startup funding and early validation.