| 摘要 |
<p>This disclosure describes an electronic support measures (ESM) system for estimating the angle of arrival of a signal which impinges on an array of antennas configured in a straight line. The antennas in the array are spaced such that the distances from the interior antennas to one of the end antennas--in terms of units of a reference length xi -are relatively prime. The system does not require a priori knowledge of the signal radio frequency. In order to enhance the computational efficiency and ability of the system, a Diophantine processing algorithm is utilized. The set of antenna spacings is selected based upon minimizing the probability that this algorithm produces an ambiguity error in the estimated angle of arrival. The computational efficiency of the system is improved relative to current systems, as it requires only N<2> real multiplications, where N+1 is the number of antennas in the array. The required N<2> real multiplications can be realized in non-interacting pipelined parallel paths, leading to reduced latency of angle estimation. As such, the ESM system in accordance with the present invention is adapted to be used in various avionics applications that were heretofore beyond the computational processing ability of known systems.</p> |
