A common framework for multitarget search and cross-cueing optimization

Despite their importance in the search theory field, the two problems we introduce in this paper have not been widely studied in the literature. The first problem addresses the optimization of the search for multiple moving targets. The second one addresses the optimization of a cross-cueing problem, i.e. the detection-confirmation problem. In this setup, the goal is to maximize chances to detect a target and confirm the detection, either by considering that two means of search are available at a given time period or by a unique mean of search at two consecutive time periods. In all the cases, the search optimization is extended to a multiperiod search for moving targets. In order to solve these two problems in a common framework, we present an effective resolution method based on constraints dualization and on a forward and backward algorithm.