ESPRIT-based 2-D direction finding with a sparse uniform array of electromagnetic vector sensors

Aperture extension (interferometry baseline extension) is achieved in this novel ESPRIT-based two-dimensional (2-D) arrival angle estimation scheme us ing a sparse (a.k.a., thin or thinned) uniform rectangular array of electro magnetic vector sensors spaced much farther apart than a half-wavelength. A n electromagnetic vector sensor is composed of six spatially co-located, or thogonally oriented, diversely polarized antennas, distinctly measuring all six electromagnetic-field components of an incident multisource wavefield, Each incident source's direction of arrival (DOA) is estimated from the so urce's electromagnetic-field vector component and serves as a coarse refere nce to disambiguate the cyclic phase ambiguities in ESPRIT's eigenvalues wh en the intervector sensor spacing exceeds a half wavelength. Simulations de monstrate the significant performance gain realizable by this method for ra dar and wireless mobile fading-channel communications.