Geolocation of Multiple Noncooperative Emitters Using Received Signal Strength: Sparsity, Resolution, and Detectability

Abstract

In this paper we investigate the problem of locating multiple non-cooperative radio frequency (RF) emitters using only received signal strength (RSS) data. We assume that the number of emitters is unknown and that individual emitters cannot be distinguished in the RSS data. Moreover, we assume that the environment in which the data has been collected has not been mapped or 'fingerprinted' by the prior collection of RSS data. Our goal is to use knowledge of the data noise level, sensor geometry, signal attenuation model, and other variables to quantify the limiting resolution that can be obtained with this type of data, and to determine the lowest power emitters that can be detected. We use this analysis to develop an efficient algorithm for estimating the number of emitters, their locations, and their transmit powers. We approach this by formulating the recovery problem as one of sparse approximation or compressed sensing. We illustrate the reasonableness of our assumptions and conclusions with both simulated and real data.