Multiple-target tracking and track management for an FMCW radar network

A multiple-target tracking problem for a frequency-modulated continuous-wave (FMCW) radar network is formulated and an integrated track management system is presented to solve the tracking problem in the presence of clutter. The FMCW radar network obtains beat frequency measurements with multiple collocated radars, each transmitting a sequence of chirps. The beat frequency measurements are associated to tracks directly in the beat frequency measurement space. The direct association eliminates range/range-rate calculations and multilateration processing, and it allows to process beat frequency measurements sequentially on a chirp by chirp basis. The sequential processing effectively decomposes the measurement-to-track association problem into a series of two-dimensional assignment problems that can be solved with much less computational effort. The solution to the measurement-to-track association problem is utilized to initiate and form new tracks and to update or delete existing tracks. Monte Carlo simulations were performed to evaluate the performance of the track management system.