Two target detection algorithms for passive multistatic radar

This paper considers the problem of passive detection with a multistatic radar system involving a noncooperative illuminator of opportunity (IO) and multiple receive platforms. An unknown source signal is transmitted by the IO, which illuminates a target of interest. These receive platforms are geographically dispersed, and collect independent target echoes due to the illumination by the same IO. We consider a generalized canonical correlation (GCC) detector for passive detection which requires the knowledge of the noise power. We derive closed-form expressions for the probabilities of false alarm and detection of this detector. For the case where the noise power is unknown, we propose a generalized likelihood ratio test (GLRT) detector to deal with the passive detection problem. Moreover, a closed-form expression for the probability of false alarm of this GLRT detector is given, which shows that the proposed GLRT detector exhibits a constant false alarm rate property with respect to the noise power. Numerical simulations demonstrate that the proposed GLRT detector generally outperforms the generalized coherence detector, a previous popular passive detector that neither requires the knowledge of the noise power. In addition, the GLRT also outperforms the GCC detector when the latter has an uncertainty in its knowledge of the noise power.