Multi-target detection using total correlation for noise radar systems

Target detection is one of the important functions of radar systems. In this paper, we present a detection method using total correlation (TC) based on information theory for noise radar systems which enables the detection of multiple targets at intermediate and low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regimes. The proposed method utilizes the largest eigenvalue of the sample covariance matrix to extract information from the transmitted signal replica, and outperforms the conventional TC detector when reflected signals have intermediate or low SNR values. Additionally, in order to avoid ambiguous target occurrence, we propose an adaptive threshold to guarantee the detection performance with the same receiving antenna elements for a given false alarm probability. The threshold is computed from the largest and smallest eigenvalue distributions based on random matrix theory. Simulations show that the proposed detection method can be used for a wide range of SNR environments, and the threshold provides definitive target detection.