Multi-Purpose Acoustic Target Tracking For Additive Situational Awareness

Abstract

The U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) has successfully used acoustics to detect, localize, and track potential threats. This information has provided a wealth of information to the individual Soldier by supplying actionable situational awareness. Two particular scenarios where these algorithms would provide useful intelligence relate to collision avoidance and monitoring drug trafficking. This research analyzes the acoustic signals of several aerial platforms in an attempt to track each target of interest. Results of different signal-processing techniques conventional beamformer via minimum variance distortionless response (MVDR) and a Least-Squares (L-S) Estimator using time difference of arrivals (TDOA) are compared and contrasted. Application of a Kalman filter to the direction of arrival (DOA) estimates is explored. The results found that although neither algorithm performed flawlessly, the TDOA L-S method required less computation time and the MVDR algorithm produced more accurate tracking. The Kalman filter also improved results when used with both techniques.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Nov 01, 2008
Accession Number
ADA490767

Entities

People

  • Latasha Solomon

Organizations

  • United States Army Research Laboratory

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes
  • Sensors
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Acoustic Signals
  • Acoustics
  • Aircrafts
  • Algorithms
  • Angle Of Arrival
  • Collision Avoidance
  • Collisions
  • Computations
  • Drug Trafficking
  • Estimators
  • Kalman Filters
  • Measurement
  • Military Research
  • Signal Processing
  • Situational Awareness
  • Target Tracking
  • Two Dimensional

Fields of Study

  • Engineering

Readers

  • Computer Vision.
  • Phased Array Antenna Design.
  • Radio communications and signal processing.