Robust Centralized CFAR Detection for Multistatic Sonar Systems

This paper proposes a novel centralized Constant false alarm ratio (CFAR) detector for multistatic sonar systems. The detector employs the idea of Variability index (Ⅵ) CFAR detection, to adaptively select the matched detection algorithm in diversified undersea environments. All the echo data from mutistatic sonar receivers are transmitted into the centralized fusion center. Firstly, the background statistics of reference cells from different nodes are analyzed. Then choose one appropriate centralized detection algorithm according to the background statistics, which refers to the centralized Cell averaging CFAR (CA-CFAR), greatest of CFAR, order statistic CFAR detection algorithms. The performance of the proposed detector is analyzed by computer simulation and measured sonar data. The results show that, compared to the centralized CA-CFAR detector, the introduced centralized detector achieves a better robustness in multiply heterogeneous undersea environments.