Evaluation of estimation algorithms part I: incomprehensive measures of performance

Practical metrics for performance evaluation of estimation algorithms are discussed. A variety of metrics useful for evaluating various aspects of the performance of an estimation algorithm is introduced and justified. They can be classified in two different ways: 1) absolute error measures (without a reference), relative error measures (with a reference), or frequency counts (of some events), and 2) optimistic (i.e., how good the performance is), pessimistic (i.e., how bad the performance is), or balanced (neither optimistic nor pessimistic). Pros and cons of these metrics and the widely-used RMS error are explained. The paper advocates replacing the RMS error in many cases by a measure called average Euclidean error     

Maximum-Likelihood Detection of Unresolved Radar Targets and Multipath

Interference in the form of multipath or uncooperative targets can seriously degrade the angle-of-arrival estimation accuracy of mutiplebeam processors. In this paper, the generalized likelihood ratio test is used to derive a test to detect the presence of interference for multiple beam processors. The detector performance is then analyzed in detail with respect to its dependence on signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), signal-to-interference ration (SIR), and on the relative phase between the target and interfering signals. It is shown that good detection performance can be obtained unless the phase difference between the target and interference signals is either in or out of phase.     

On the Performance of Some Sequential Multiple-Decision Procedures

The performance of several sequential procedures for the following multiple-decision problem is investigated. Samples from k random processes (or populations) are available, k at a time (one from each process), to a receiver or data processor. One process contains a signal; the other k - 1 are statistically identical noise. The receiver is to select the odd process (locate the signal), with prescribed probability of error. The optimal receiver makes the selection in minimum average time. Analytical and Monte Carlo computations were performed under the hypothesis that the processes sampled are Rayleigh; however, a method for extrapolating results to other cases is given. The parameter k is allowed to vary from 2 to 1000.     

R. Buccheri, J. van Paradijs, M. A. Alpar, The Many of Neutron Stars

We see neutron stars principally by their radio and X-ray emission. Their appearance in these different bands depends on whether the emission comes from the surface or its magnetosphere. New phenomena continue to be found from neutron stars, which makes it an exciting and topical research area. This volume is a collection of the papers from a NATO Advanced Study Institute held in Italy in October 1996. Many, and for me the most interesting ones, are substantial reviews on topics such as Pulsar magnetic fields and glitches (M. Ruderman), Radio pulsar population properties (D. Lorimer), Gamma-ray emission from CGRO pulsars (G. Kanbach), Neutron stars and black holes in X-ray binaries (J. van Paradijs), Kilohertz quasi-periodic oscillations in low-mass X-ray binaries (M. van der Klis), Thermonuclear burning on rapidly accreting neutron stars (L. Bildsten), On the X-ray emission properties of rotation powered pulsars (W. Becker and J. Truemper). It will serve as a useful reference and source book for students in high energy astrophysics and related fields. The high price may deter its purchase by individuals, but it will be a good volume for a library needing recent coverage on neutron stars. It does not of course include the most recent developments on anomalous X-ray pulsars or magnetars. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Techniques for transmitting digital data on the spacelab's analogvideo channel

A study was made of various techniques for transmitting digital data over a composite video channel, with data from experiments on the Space Shuttle Orbiter in mind. Broadcast television telecommunications schemes and other techniques described in the literature were reviewed and compared. PSK (phase shift keying) MPSK (M-ary PSK), and or PAM (pulse amplitude modulation), which can be transmitted on visible lines of a frame, unassigned lines of the VBI (vertical blanking interval), or during the HBI (horizontal blanking interval), were all judged attractive under the proper conditions. However, PAM on visible lines or during the VBI should be relatively easy to implement, provide adequate average data rates, and give acceptable BERs (bit error rates)     

双管头部进气旋流-突扩燃烧室冷态流场研究

本文对双管头部进气旋流-突扩燃烧室模型进行了冷态流场试验研究,以探索进气方式(全旋型或部分旋型)、旋流强度(旋流数S或旋流角(?))、旋流室出口扩张角2α、旋流室长径比l/d、内通道相对面积F等参数对燃烧室流场结构的影响规律.结果表明,适当选择燃烧室结构参数可以在燃烧室中形成稳定的中心回流区和头部旋涡回流区.当(?)=45°、α=15°、l/d=1.3、F=0.41时,除了形成旋流室回流区外,在其尾部还形成了一个较大的、切向分速较低的中心回流区,两者“联串”在一起.部分旋的中心回流区长度与相同旋流角全旋进气时的回流区长度几乎相等,但总压损失却降低63.4%.     

飞机结构腐蚀级别评定准则详析

腐蚀防护与控制方案是确保老龄飞机持续适航性的基本结构维护方案。腐蚀评级是腐蚀防护与控制的核心。提出以"腐蚀原因"、"腐蚀类别"和"腐蚀程度"为判断依据的腐蚀评级准则,不仅大大提高了腐蚀评级效率,并且已得到波音公司认可及中国民用航空总局的批准。     

Digital data over video channels: Techniques for Spacelab

Various techniques for transmitting digital data over a composite video channel are examined, with a view to transmitting data from experiments on the Space Shuttle orbiter. PSK (phase-shift keying), MPSK (m-ary PSK), or PAM (pulse-amplitude modulation), which can be transmitted on visible lines of a frame, unassigned lines of the VBI (vertical blanking interval), or during the HBI (horizontal blanking interval), are all found to be attractive under the proper conditions. However, PAM on visible lines or during the VBI should be relatively easy to implement, provide adequate average data rates, and give acceptable BERs (bit error rates)     

Order out of Randomness: Self-Organization Processes in Astrophysics

Self-organization is a property of dissipative nonlinear processes that are governed by a global driving force and a local positive feedback mechanism, which creates regular geometric and/or temporal patterns, and decreases the entropy locally, in contrast to random processes. Here we investigate for the first time a comprehensive number of (17) self-organization processes that operate in planetary physics, solar physics, stellar physics, galactic physics, and cosmology. Self-organizing systems create spontaneous “order out of randomness”, during the evolution from an initially disordered system to an ordered quasi-stationary system, mostly by quasi-periodic limit-cycle dynamics, but also by harmonic (mechanical or gyromagnetic) resonances. The global driving force can be due to gravity, electromagnetic forces, mechanical forces (e.g., rotation or differential rotation), thermal pressure, or acceleration of nonthermal particles, while the positive feedback mechanism is often an instability, such as the magneto-rotational (Balbus-Hawley) instability, the convective (Rayleigh-Bénard) instability, turbulence, vortex attraction, magnetic reconnection, plasma condensation, or a loss-cone instability. Physical models of astrophysical self-organization processes require hydrodynamic, magneto-hydrodynamic (MHD), plasma, or N-body simulations. Analytical formulations of self-organizing systems generally involve coupled differential equations with limit-cycle solutions of the Lotka-Volterra or Hopf-bifurcation type.     

Distortion Reduction in Phase Modulation

When a phase-modulated carrier of the form sin (wt+?) is multiplied by cos (wt), the recovered phase modulation is sin (?), which is a distorted version of . For small ?, the error is small, but is appreciable as A approaches unity or more. When ? is complicated (several subcarriers for example), the intermodulation can seriously degrade the system. This paper discusses distortion reduction by means of predistortion and postdistortion.     

Effects of a Finite-Width Decision Threshold on Binary CPSK and FSK Communication Systems

The function of the receiver in a binary digital communication system is to make a binary (?space?, ?mark? or ?"0?, ?1?) decision by comparing the signal values from the mark and space filters (or correlators) at known successive time intervals (?bit? or ?baud? time intervals). When the signal value out of the mark filter is greater than that out of the space filter, it is decided that mark or 1 is transmitted, and vice versa. It is of fundamental importance to know the exact instant of time at which the two filter outputs are to be compared. This is the problem of synchronization between the transmitter and the receiver. In this paper, we assume a system that is perfectly synchronized. In a practical system, the difference between the two filter outputs must differ from a threshold by some finite amount in order to cause the device to respond reliably. The examination of the effects of this dead zone (finite-width decision threshold) on digital transmission systems is of important practical interest. Its effects on binary differentially coherent phase-shift-keying, and m-level phase-shift-keying systems have been investigated previously. In this paper we consider its effects on binary coherent phase-shift-keying (CPSK), coherent orthogonal (CFSK), and noncoherent orthogonal (NCFSK) systems. The probability of bit error and the channel capacity of each system is obtained in terms of the dead zone threshold.     

Stochastic game approach to air operations

A command and control (C/sup 2/) problem for military air operations is addressed. Specifically, we consider C/sup 2/ problems for air vehicles against ground-based targets and defensive systems. The problem is viewed as a stochastic game. We restrict our attention to the C/sup 2/ level where the problem may consist of a few unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAVs) or aircraft (or possibly teams of vehicles), less than say, a half-dozen enemy surface-to-air missile air defense units (SAMs), a few enemy assets (viewed as targets from our standpoint), and some enemy decoys (assumed to mimic SAM radar signatures). At this low level, some targets are mapped out and possible SAM sites that are unavoidably part of the situation are known. One may then employ a discrete stochastic game problem formulation to determine which of these SAMs should optimally be engaged (if any), and by what series of air vehicle operations. We provide analysis, numerical implementation, and simulation for full state-feedback and measurement feedback control within this C/sup 2/ context. Sensitivity to parameter uncertainty is discussed. Some insight into the structure of optimal and near-optimal strategies for C/sup 2/ is obtained. The analysis is extended to the case of observations which may be affected by adversarial inputs. A heuristic based on risk-sensitive control is applied, and it is found that this produces improved results over more standard approaches.     

Digital Communication Systems in Impulsive Atmospheric Radio Noise

Analyses are presented of the performance of binary and M-ary coherent and noncoherent communication systems operating in the impulsive atmospheric radio noise environment. The receiver is usually a maximum likelihood detector for white Gaussian interference and therefore has the form of a parallel bank of matched filters followed by decision circuitry. By employing a Poisson or generalized Shot noise model for the impulsive noise with a suitable probability density function (pdf), closed-form expressions and bounds of error probabilities for M-ary noncoherent and coherent amplitude-shift keying (ASK), phase-shift keying (PSK), and frequency-shift keying (FSK) systems are obtained and the results discussed.     

Resolution of signal sources via spectral moment estimation

In different practical situations it is desired to estimate the number of signal sources and their positions in space or in frequency domain. The first problem is known as the detection or the order estimation and the second one as the resolution. For the resolution problem techniques such as nonlinear least squares (NLSM), high-order Yule-Walker method (HOYW), multiple signal classification (MUSIC), Pisarenko harmonic retrieval method, min-norm method, estimation of signal parameters by rotational invariance technique (ESPRIT), were proposed (Marple, 1987 and Stoica and Moses, 1997). All these high-resolution methods are based on the analysis of the signal covariance matrix. But the covariance matrix is not the only choice to represent the signal spectrum. In different applications (weather radars, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) signal processing, ultrasound imaging in medicine, atmospheric turbulence measurements) the signal spectrum can be modeled through its algebraic moments. Recently a number of efficient nonparametric methods have been proposed to estimate the algebraic spectral moments (Monakov, 1999). The presented paper is an attempt to solve the direction of arrival (DOA) problem via estimation of the algebraic spectral moments. A method proposed in the article is comparable in its accuracy with the MUSIC method. At the same time its computational burden is much lower. The method permits to estimate the signal power of sources easily to complete the full spectral line analysis. Additionally the method shows good robustness in situations when signal sources have noticeable spatial extend     

Envelope Threshold Detection in a Class of Non-Gaussian Interference

This paper considers the detection of a sinusoidal or chirp signal imbedded in wideband FM interference (as might be generated by some types of active jamming), such that after pulse compression or other integration, the interference can be approximated by a sum of sinusoids of independent phase. The detection probability in such non-Gaussian noise is compared to that for Gaussian noise, with the Gaussian result approached, as required, in the limit that the number of sinusoids in the sum increases without bound. For detection using a comparison of the envelope with a threshold which yields a given false-alarm probability (CFAR detection), the detection probability is improved over the case of Gaussian noise, so that the usual approach basing the design on Gaussian noise would be conservative. Using a threshold determined from the envelope mean, the FM interference yields a lower false-alarm probability than for Gaussian noise, with detection probability only slightly degraded.     

Robust autofocus algorithm for ISAR imaging of moving targets

A robust autofocus approach, referred to as AUTOCLEAN (AUTOfocus via CLEAN), is proposed for the motion compensation in ISAR (inverse synthetic aperture radar) imaging of moving targets. It is a parametric algorithm based on a very flexible data model which takes into account arbitrary range migration and arbitrary phase errors across the synthetic aperture that may be induced by unwanted radial motion of the target as well as propagation or system instability. AUTOCLEAN can be classified as a multiple scatterer algorithm (MSA), but it differs considerably from other existing MSAs in several aspects: (1) Dominant scatterers are selected automatically in the 2D image domain; (2) scatterers may not be well isolated or very dominant; (3) phase and RCS information from each selected scatterer are combined in an optimal way; (4) the troublesome phase unwrapping step is avoided. AUTOCLEAN is computationally efficient and involves only a sequence of FFTs. Another good feature associated with AUTOCLEAN is that its performance can be progressively improved by assuming a larger number of dominant scatterers for the target. Numerical and experimental results have shown that AUTOCLEAN is a very robust autofocus tool for ISAR imaging     

Motion Compensation for Synthetic Aperture Radar

A generalized motion compensation approach applicable to all SAR modes, i.e., strip mapping (side-looking or squint), spotlight (or telescope) mapping, and Doppler beam sharpened mapping (DBS), is described. The basic concept is the formation for unit vector ? and the slaving of the real illuminating antenna and the processed synthetic antenna to this unit vector. The amount of motion compensation which is required is developed in terms of transfer curves for the main motion reduction paths, i.e., translational, rotational (lever arm), and real antenna stabilization. The transfer curves are obtained by dividing the expected motion spectrum by the required sensitivity spectrum. The most critical motion reduction path for typical parameters is shown to be the translational path. The lever arm and real antenna stabilization paths are less critical, but must also be implemented.     

A digital quadrature demodulation system

Existing digital quadrature demodulation techniques sample the input at either 2B Hz or 4B Hz, select the even samples as the in-phase (I), and interpolate the odd samples to give the quadrature (Q), output. The signal bandwidth is B. We propose a demodulation system to produce I and Q samples at arbitrary sampling rate greater than 2B Hz. The system eliminates the IF downconversion step with a special sampling scheme. The even samples correspond to the I component, while the Q components are the filtered output. The filter can be a lowpass or least squares (LS) filter. The lowpass filter design is based on trade-offs between the filter length and the degree of oversampling. It produces similar results as previous work when the sampling rate is 2B Hz or 4B Hz. Unlike existing methods which assume the input is white, a LS filter, on the other hand, can make use of input signal characteristics to achieve a better result. The higher the correlation in the input the larger the improvement. The cost for LS filtering is a coefficient update step if the input is time varying. A scheme to cancel dc offset from analog to digital (A/D) converters is also given     

Error Probability in Binary Digital Communication in the Presence of an Interfering Signal

The presence of an interferring signal i(t) in a binary coherent symmetric channel is investigated. The probability of error is maximum when i(t) is antipodal to the transmitted signal, so(t) or s1 (t). The error probability is derived in the presence of a delayed interfering signal - so (t - r), where r is the time delay. An example of phase shift keying signals is given.