Directional Finding for Sources with Unknown Bandwidths and Center Frequencies

There is a current Air Force need to research, develop and implement direction finding algorithms that are capable of precise localization of sources with unknown bandwidth and center frequencies. Variety of broadband sources having different bandwidths and center frequencies, SNR-levels, cross-correlation or coherence properties, appear in many current and future COMINT applications. Although Direction-of-Arrival (DOA) estimation for narrowband and wideband sources has been an active research topic for over two decades, it appears that comprehensive study addressing complete parameter estimation, as set forth in this SBIR topic, has not been hitherto undertaken. In this proposal, Gitam Technologies, Inc. (GTI) proposes to conduct a comprehensive study of the entire gamut of DOA estimation related literature, perform detailed theoretical performance analysis and verify performance with simulation. The Phase-I objective is to prepare a definitive trade-off study of the capabilities and limitations of the algorithms. The overall objective is to develop an efficient means to perform high accuracy, high-resolution direction finding and spectral parameter estimation for multiple simultaneous wideband emitters. One of the earlier wideband DOA estimation approach has been applied to the given challenge problem, and the preliminary estimates of DOAs and bandwidths appear encouraging.