Research On DOA Estimation Based On Three Dimensional Arrays

Direction of arrival estimation using linear arrays and planar arrays has been researched for many years.However,we can only obtain the azimuth angle by a linear array.By utilizing a planar array,both the azimuth and the elevation angles can be obtained.Unfortunately,a planar array can not well estimate the elevation angles of the incoming signals.By arranging the antennas in a three dimensional geometry,we can achieve a better elevation angle estimation performance.Therefore,it is of great necessity to make a study on the direction of arrival estimation based on a three dimensional antenna arrays.In this paper,a direction of arrival estimation algorithm for three-parallel arrays is proposed by exploiting the subarray partition method.The three-parallel array is divided into two vertical parallel planar arrays.Then the propagator method is used to acquired the angle parameter matrices.Compared to the parallel arrays based algorithm,the proposed algorithm has no angle estimation failure problem.The angle estimation problem for a 2L-shaped arrays is also demonstrated.The angle parameters are estimated by using the propagator method for the two L-shaped subarray of the 2L-shaped arrays.All the sensors of the 2L-shaped arrays are used by rearranging the sensor output data.Besides,the reconstructed array output vectors have no redundant data,which reduces the computational burdens.Computational simulations are made to demonstrate the validity of the proposed method.Simulation results show that the proposed method suffers no angle estimation failure problem.Furthermore,the proposed algorithm is computationally efficient and performs well for the elevation angle estimation.