Micro‐Doppler frequency estimation and association via the inverse‐free complex SBL TVAR method

Abstract

Abstract A micro‐Doppler frequency estimation and association algorithm of the space target based on the time‐varying autoregressive (TVAR) model is proposed herein. The calculation time of the existing algorithms grows significantly with the problem size, and micro‐Doppler frequencies of different scattering centres are associated incorrectly where the frequencies intersect. The echo of the space target is modelled by the TVAR model, then the TVAR coefficients and instantaneous frequencies are estimated through the fast sparse Bayes learning (SBL) algorithm, finally, the micro‐Doppler frequencies of different scattering centres are associated in the frequency–frequency change rate domain. The effectiveness and rapidity of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated by simulation results.