Far-field DOA estimation and source localization for different scenarios in a distributed sensor network

Recent developments in the integrated circuits and wireless communications not only open up many possibilities but also introduce challenging issues for the collaborative processing of signals for source localization and beamforming in an energy-constrained distributed sensor network. In signal processing, various sensor array processing algorithms and concepts have been adopted, but must be further tailored to match the communication and computational constraints. Sometimes the constraints are such that none of the existing algorithms would be an efficient option for the defined problem and as the result; the necessity of developing a new algorithm becomes undeniable.;In this dissertation, we present the theoretical and the practical issues of Direction-Of-Arrival (DOA) estimation and source localization using the Approximate-Maximum-Likelihood (AML) algorithm for different scenarios. We first investigate a robust algorithm design for coherent source DOA estimation in a limited reverberant environment. Then, we provide a least-square (LS) solution for source localization based on our newly proposed virtual array model.;In another scenario, we consider the determination of the location of a disturbance source which emits both wideband acoustic and seismic signals. We devise an enhanced AML algorithm to process the data collected at the acoustic sensors. For processing the seismic signals, two distinct algorithms are investigated to determine the DOAs. Then, we consider a basic algorithm for fusion of the results yielded by the acoustic and seismic arrays.;We also investigate the theoretical and practical issues of DOA estimation in a three-dimensional (3D) scenario. We show that the performance of the proposed 3D AML algorithm converges to the Cramer-Rao Bound. We use the concept of an isotropic array to reduce the complexity of the proposed algorithm by advocating a decoupled 3D version. We also explore a modified version of the decoupled 3D AML algorithm which can be used for DOA estimation with non-isotropic arrays.;In this dissertation, for each scenario, efficient numerical implementations of the corresponding AML algorithm are derived and applied into a real-time sensor network testbed. Extensive simulations as well as experimental results are presented to verify the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms.