Target perceivability and its applications

A concept of target perceivability is introduced, which is related to such concepts as target existence and target observability. Its probability prov ides a basis for an integrated approach to track initiation, confirmation, termination, and refinement of track maintenance algorithms. This paper pro poses the concepts of target perceivability and presents a recursion of its probability based on hidden Markov models (HMMs) and their applications to tracker analysis, development, and design, in particular, in the context o f the PDA method. Specifically, several important quantities and track life are analyzed; a perceivability-based probabilistic approach to track confi rmation and termination is proposed; two versions of perceivability-based P DA trackers are presented. Simulation results are provided to demonstrate t heir performance.