A signal detection algorithm based on higher-order statistics for HFSW-OTH radar

A signal detection algorithm based on higher-order statistics (HOS) is presented and applied to ship detection of high frequency surface wave over-the-horizon radar (HFSW-OTHR), where a complex domain time delay estimation (TDE) algorithm based on HOS is used to restrain the background noise. The key problem of reducing estimation variance of TDE based on HOS is solved under short data samples and low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) situations. The detection performance of the proposed algorithm has advantages over that of traditional methods under a low SNR condition. The results by simulations and actual HF radar data show that the algorithm can obtain the desired detection performance (P/sub d/=90%, p/sub f/=10/sup -6/) when the SNR of the original data is only about 11 dB. Therefore, the resultant detector can not only extend the detection range, but also improve the performance of detection.