Acoustic vector-sensor array beamforming based on fourth-order cumulants

Abstract

Abstract: Some high-resolution direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation methods, such as the MUSIC method, have been developed based on vector-sensor array. However, these high-resolution methods suffer from serious drawbacks. Indeed, they are not able to estimate coherent signals and sensitive to calibration errors. Mainly to overcome these limitations and in particular to satisfy practical engineering application, vector-sensor array beamforming based on fourth-order cumulants is adopted in this paper. The main interest in using fourth-order cumulants instead of second-order ones in vector-sensor array processing application is the aperture extension property of higher-order cumulants, which makes it possible to increase both the resolution and the number of sources to be processed from a given array, and suppress the Gaussian noise. Based on this method, smaller size of array and higher accuracy of DOA estimation can be realized, besides, this method is less sensitive to the coherence of the signals and calibration errors, which makes it possible to work well in engineering application. The results of computer simulation and analysis of data from outfield trials show that this method excels traditional direct estimation and can improve estimation capability of vector-sensor arrays.