volume | PIER Journals

Abstract

A uniform triangular array (UTA) is proposed for physics-based 2D direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimations of unknown incoming signals. Three capacitively loaded top-hat antennas are used as array elements. Unlike conventional array-based direction finding (DF) systems, complex antenna radiation patterns are used in array manifold calculations and DOA predictions, where coupling among array elements is naturally resolved. Both continuous wave (CW) signals and single tone signals with amplitude modulation (AM) are considered in DF simulations. Cramer-Rao bound (CRB) values are calculated to provide theoretical lower bounds of DF accuracies. Multiple signal classification (MUSIC) algorithm is used to further demonstrate the DF performance of the triangular antenna array without any angle ambiguities within the field of view from 0˚ to 360˚ in the azimuth direction and from 1.25˚ to 178.75˚ in the elevation direction.

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Dr. Kai Ren