BIAS PHENOMENON AND COMPENSATION FOR PDA JPDA ALGORITHMS/

Probabilistic Data Association (PDA) and Joint PDA (JPDA) algorithms a re approaches for target tracking which have received considerable att ention. It has been observed for some years that they both yield biase d tracks in a multitarget environment. However, most work assumes no f alse alarms and the rejection phenomenon of the JPDA algorithm has not been reported. In this paper, the general procedure of multitarget tr acking and the PDA/JPDA algorithms are first described. Their bias phe nomenon is simulated and investigated. It is observed that (1) the JPD A algorithm has less bias than the PDA algorithm in a clean environmen t. Both of them yield coalescence, (2) the JPDA algorithm has coalesce nce and rejection bias phenomenon while the PDA algorithm has only coa lescence phenomenon in a clutter environment. Bias compensated algorit hms are then presented using the polynomial regression method. Simulat ions are carried out to select the order of polynomial regression. Mon te Carlo simulations also demonstrate the effectiveness of the compens ated PDA/JPDA algorithms. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights re served.