SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR RADAR-BASED DETERMINATION OF A NUMBER OF PASSENGERS INSIDE A VEHICLE PASSENGER COMPARTMENT

A method of operating a radar sensor system for determining a number of passengers in a vehicle passenger compartment. The radar sensor system includes at least one radar transmitting antenna and at least one radar receiving antenna and an evaluation and control unit for evaluating Doppler information from the received radar waves. The method includes: transmitting radar waves towards the vehicle passenger compartment; receiving radar waves reflected by a passenger or by passengers being present in the vehicle passenger compartment; generating received radar signals from the received radar waves; mathematically decomposing the received radar signals into a plurality of received signal components; providing values of the received signal components regarding a characteristic parameter to a classifier trained with a plurality of scenarios; identifying one of trained scenarios, based on the provided values; and generating an output signal indicative of the identified scenario.