Discrete extended Kalman filter for radar point error reduction

A recently proposed method of reducing target glint errors in radar systems is further enhanced with the development of a discrete target model and discrete Kalman filter (DKF). Simulation results demonstrating the DKF are presented, and the limits of the usefulness of this method are investigated. The major advantage of the DKF is that it can be implemented in software in the digital processor of the radar offering flexibility over continuous-time filters     

Radar Target Pointing Error Reduction Using Extended Kalman Filtering

A new method of reducing target glint errors in radar systems is presented. The target is modeled as n reflectors whose magnitudes and phases are known. The reflector positions are described by a dynamical model driven by white Gaussian noise. The resulting vibrations of the target reflectors produce glintlike pointing errors in the radar system. An extended Kalman filter is developed to estimate the positions of the target reflectors; this information is used to substantially reduce the pointing error due to glint. Data illustrating this glint reduction is given. The model is extended by the inclusion of clutter effects modeled in the same fashion as the glint phenomenon. The results presented indicate the limits of usefulness of this technique as a function of both receiver noise and relative clutter amplitude.     

False alarm effects on estimation in multitarget trackers

An analysis of false alarm effects on tracking filter performance in multitarget track-while-scan radars, using variable correlation gates, is presented. The false alarms considered originate from noise, clutter, and crossing targets. The dimensions of the correlation gates are determined by filter prediction and measurement error variances. Track association is implanted either by means of a distance weighted average of the observations or by the nearest neighbor rule. State estimation is performed by means of a second-order discrete Kalman filter, taking into consideration random target maneuvers. Measurements are made in polar coordinates, while target dynamics are estimated in Cartesian coordinates, resulting in coupled linear filter equations. the effect of false alarms on the observation noise covariance matrix, and hence on state estimation errors, is analyzed. A computer simulation example, implementing radar target tracking with a variable correlation gate in the presence of false alarms, is discussed     

Sensor Netting via the Discrete Time Extended Kalman Filter

An implementation is presented of the discrete time extended Kalman filter which the authors have found useful for sensor netting in a variety of tactical radar and ballistic missile defense (BMD) applications. A Potter square root version of the extended Kalman filter is used where vector measurements are processed serially. Both the state and covariance equations are initialized by processing past measurements. The initialization technique and the filter are used in two tactical radar tracking examples.     

Efficient Approximation of Kalman Filter for Target Tracking

A Kalman filter in the Cartesian coordinates is described for a maneuvering target when the radar sensor measures range, bearing, and elevation angles in the polar coordinates at high data rates. An approximate gain computation algorithm is developed to determine the filter gains for on-line microprocessor implementation. In this approach, gains are computed for three uncoupled filters and multiplied by a Jacobian transformation determined from the measured target position and orientation. The algorithm is compared with the extended Kalman filter for a typical target trajectory in a naval gun fire control system. The filter gains and the tracking errors for the proposed algorithm are nearly identical to the extended Kalman filter, while the computation requirements are reduced by a factor of four.     

基于广义Kalman估计的机载雷达高精度控制系统

 研究了在某型现役机载雷达系统中, 采用广义Kalman 滤波器方法来预估目标机的俯仰角和方位角,产生跟踪目标用的雷达天线驱动信号, 替代传统的速率陀螺测量元件来补偿本机机动所造成的扰动的方法,同时对探测信号本身所具有的延迟起到了补偿作用。对目标的运动采用直角坐标系中的Singer 模型描述, 而对测量信号则是应用极坐标系中的描述, 采用广义Kalman 滤波器来完成估计, 即在每一步的估计和控制中对计算测量方程进行线性化结果, 实现两种坐标系的转换。通过应用Matlab/ Simulink 软件对整个系统的建模、设计及仿真研究, 得到了满意的结果。     

Detection of chi-square fluctuating targets in arbitrary clutter

In a recent paper, general expressions were derived for the density and cumulative probability functions of the amplitude of a linear matched-filter output given a nonfluctuating target in a clutter-limited environment. These expressions were based on the clutter amplitude density function. The results are extended to calculate the cumulative probability function of the output of a linear matched filter used to detect a chi-square fluctuating target in a clutter-limited environment. The resulting method is applied to a common radar clutter model, and experimental sonar data.     

Design of a practical tracking algorithm with radar measurements

The extended Kalman filter (EKF) has been widely used as a nonlinear filtering method for radar tracking problems. However, it has been found that if cross-range measurement errors of the target position are large, the performance of the conventional EKF degrades considerably due to nonnegligible nonlinear effects. A new filtering algorithm for improving the tracking performance with radar measurements is developed based on the fact that correct evaluation of the measurement error covariance is possible in the Cartesian coordinate system. The proposed algorithm may be viewed as a modification of the EKF in which the variance of the range measurement errors is evaluated in an adaptive manner. The filter structure facilitates the incorporation of the sequential measurement processing scheme, and this makes the resulting algorithm favorable to both estimation accuracy and computational efficiency. Computer simulation results show that the proposed method offers superior performance in comparison to previous methods. Moreover, our developed algorithm provides some useful insight into the radar tracking problem     

MTI Optimization in a Multiple-Clutter Environment

A means of optimizing a moving target indicator (MTI) filter for rejecting several types of clutter, which are generated by different mechanisms such as by rain or the ground, is formulated. lt is found that the optimal performance of such a filter depends on the spectral density functions, average radar cross sections, and the relative mean Doppler frequencies of each type of clutter. lt is shown that the optimal improvement factor of such a filter is bounded by the weighted average (weighted in accordance with the radar cross sections of the clutter types) of the improvement factor for the individual clutter type. lt is also shown that the improvement factor of such a filter is a function of the relative mean Doppler frequency f0 between the clutter types. As f0 increases, the performance of the MTI system degrades. The worst improvement factor occurs when f0 is equal to half of the radar pulse-repetition frequency (PRF).     

Radar Partial Coherence Theory: An Introduction

The nature of physical phenomena is such that scattering from portions of an object, a number of objects, or clutter, is not completely unrelated; the underlying environment causes some degree of order in the phenomenon. Radar partial coherence theory describes a structure for the general target, or clutter, and its relationship to radar cross section, waveform coding, and the radar output signal. The clutter ambiguity function is introduced for extended bodies and embraces the (Woodward) ambiguity function for a point target. Due to nonlinear effects caused by partial coherence within the general target, radar signals and targets are formulated in terms of mutual coherence functions. The basic quantities describing the radar output are 1) the radar mutual coherence function (formulated in terms of the radar waveform) and 2) the target mutual coherence function which depends upon target properties, physical environment, and viewing aspect. Random noise (independent point scatterers) and partially coherent portions of reflecting bodies are made accountable in the theory. Partial coherence effects are treated as patches of reflected energy: self-coherent energy patches plus mutually coherent energy among the patches.     

Streamlining measurement iteration for EKF target tracking

The estimation problem is defined, and a review of how the linear estimation approach of Kalman filtering is extrapolated to form an extended Kalman filter (EKF), applicable for state estimation in nonlinear systems is presented. A mechanization of an EKF variation known as an iterated EKF, offering improved tracking performance, is treated. A streamlined version of an iterated EKF that has a lesser computational burden (fewer operations per cycle or time step) than prior formulations is offered. A nonlinear filtering application example, to be used as a testbed for this new approach, is described, and the detailed modeling considerations as needed for exoatmospheric random-variable radar target tracking are discussed. The performance of the streamlined mechanization is illustrated in this radar target tracking example, and comparisons are made with the performance of an EKF without measurement iteration     

Tracking a ballistic target: comparison of several nonlinear filters

This paper studies the problem of tracking a ballistic object in the reentry phase by processing radar measurements. A suitable (highly nonlinear) model of target motion is developed and the theoretical Cramer-Rao lower bounds (CRLB) of estimation error are derived. The estimation performance (error mean and standard deviation; consistency test) of the following nonlinear filters is compared: the extended Kalman filter (EKF), the. statistical linearization, the particle filtering, and the unscented Kalman filter (UKF). The simulation results favor the EKF; it combines the statistical efficiency with a modest computational load. This conclusion is valid when the target ballistic coefficient is a priori known.     

Tracking a Maneuvering Target Using Input Estimation

The conventional Kalman tracking filter incurs mean tracking errors in the presence of a pilot-induced target maneuver. Chan,Hu, and Plant proposed a solution to this problem which used themean deviations of the residual innovation sequence to make corrections to the Kalman filter. This algorithm is further developedhere for the case of a one-dimensional Kalman filter, for which an Implementable closed-form recursive relation exists. Simulation results show that the Chan, Hu, and Plant method can accurately detect and correct an acceleration discontinuity under a variety of maneuver models and radar parameters. Also, the inclusion of thislogic into a multiple hypothesis tracking system is briefly outlined.     

Manoeuvring target tracking in clutter using particle filters

A particle filter (PF) is a recursive numerical technique which uses random sampling to approximate the optimal solution to target tracking problems involving nonlinearities and/or non-Gaussianity. A set of particle filtering methods for tracking and manoeuvering target in clutter from angle-only measurements is presented and evaluated. The aim is to compare PFs to a well-established tracking algorithm, the IMM-PDA-EKF (interacting multiple model, probabilistic data association, extended Kalman filter), and to provide an insight into which aspects of PF design are of most importance under given conditions. Monte Carlo simulations show that the use of a resampling scheme which produces particles with distinct values offers significant improvements under almost all conditions. Interestingly, under all conditions considered here,using this resampling scheme with blind particle proposals is shown to be superior, in the sense of providing improved performance for a fixed computational expense, to measurement-directed particle proposals with the same resampling scheme. This occurs even under conditions favourable to the use of measurement-directed proposals. The IMM-PDA-EKF performs poorly compared with the PFs for large clutter densities but is more effective when the measurements are precise.     

自由段弹道目标跟踪算法在工程中的应用

在对弹道目标跟踪预警的工程实践中,雷达系统对目标运动的信息处理速度尤为重要,因而,文章选取自适应跟踪模型与卡尔曼滤波相结合的方法解决自由段弹道目标的跟踪问题,并与扩展卡尔曼跟踪算法做了对比分析。仿真显示,2种滤波方式分别与自适应跟踪模型相结合后,卡尔曼滤波和扩展卡尔曼滤波跟踪性能相差不大,但其算法简单、运算时间短,可以较好满足自由段弹道目标跟踪的工程需求。     

FDEKF在反辐射无人机抗目标雷达关机中的应用

基于捷联惯导/反辐射导引头组合抗目标雷达关机制导方案,研究了有限差分卡尔曼滤波(FDEKF)方法在对目标雷达被动定位中的应用。考虑反辐射导引头测角存在非线性特性,提出了一种基于扩展状态变量维数的方法实现了目标状态估计和导引头非线性特性补偿。仿真结果表明,FDEKF是一种具有良好性能的非线性滤波方法,可以代替传统的EKF解决反辐射无人机对目标雷达的被动定位问题。     

基于CDKF的快速协方差交叉融合跟踪算法研究

随着目标抗干扰能力的增强,单一寻的制导方式很难完成对目标的稳定跟踪和精确打击,需采用多种探测器作为传感器,提供多种观测数据以实现对目标的稳定跟踪和精确打击。建立了适当的目标运动模型和观测模型,利用中心差分卡尔曼滤波（CDKF）变换处理模型的非线性问题,避免了求解复杂的雅克比矩阵。对于分布式多传感器融合,传统的方法多采用协方差交叉（CI）融合方法,但是这类方法需要寻优求解。而快速协方差交叉（FCI）则不需要进行寻优过程,且计算量小。在此基础上,提出了用于多传感器目标跟踪的CDKF-FCI融合算法。最后,对算法进行了仿真分析,并进一步验证了提出算法的有效性。     

A Nonadaptive Processing of Radar Pulse Trains for Clutter Rejection

The problem of detecting coherent pulse trains with uniform amplitude in a clutter-plus-noise environment is considered. A radar processor for detecting targets moving radially with respect to the clutter is proposed. The minimum interpulse spacing of the transmitted signal is assumed long enough that returns are not received simultaneously from different ranges within a region of extended clutter, and the central frequency of the clutter power spectrum is postulated to be known. The processor is singled out as the linear filter, orthogonal to the clutter central frequency component, which yields the maximum ratio of peak signal power to average noise power. The filter can be implemented by slightly modifying the structure of the conventional matched filter. The performance of such a filter is compared with that achievable if full a priori knowledge of the input interference were available and with that of the conventional matched filter. This comparison is made on a signal-to-interference power ratio basis after assuming a transmitted signal consisting of equally spaced pulses and an interference characterized by an exponential covariance matrix.     

A Model for Generating Synthetic VHF SAR Forest Clutter Images

We propose a model for generating low-frequency synthetic aperture radar (SAR) clutter that relates model parameters to physical characteristics of the scene. The model includes both distributed scattering and large-amplitude discrete clutter responses. The model also incorporates the SAR imaging process, which introduces correlation among image pixels. The model may be used to generate synthetic clutter for a range of environmental operating conditions for use in target detection performance evaluation of the radar and automatic target detection/recognition algorithms. We derive a statistical representation of the proposed clutter model's pixel amplitudes and compare with measured data from the CARABAS-II SAR. Simulated clutter images capture the structure and amplitude responses seen in the measured data. A statistical analysis shows an order of magnitude improvement in model fit error compared with standard maximum-likelihood (ML) density fitting methods.