DOA estimation method for underwater acoustic signals based on two-dimensional power distribution (TPD) for few element array

Direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation has always been one of the significant techniques in underwater acoustic signal processing, which can be used to obtain the spatial angular information of the targets. High resolution performance is one of the concerns in the DOA estimation. The DOA estimation method based on the Richardson-Lucy deconvolution algorithm (RL-dCv) proposed in recent years can obtain higher resolution and lower sidelobe beam power than the CBF method. However, the method suffers from a low resolution and estimation precision in the case of insufficient array elements. Addressing the problem, a DOA estimation method based on the two-dimensional power distribution (TPD) is proposed in this paper. The method uses the Kronecker product operation to extract the two-dimensional power distribution matrix (TM) from the beam power function, and then uses the compression sensing algorithm to solve the matrix with the least influence of the noise. Since the value in the TM is restricted by the two angle sets, the method improves the estimation precision, and reduces the requirement for the number of array elements. It can get more accurate estimation results and higher resolution in the case of insufficient elements array. Experiments including simulations in different scenes and real lake experiments are implemented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed method.