Robust adaptive beamforming using a novel signal power estimation algorithm

Abstract Recently, many robust adaptive beamforming (RAB) methods based on covariance matrix reconstruction have been proposed. Motivated by the idea, in this paper, a novel and efficient signal power estimator is devised to reconstruct the interference-plus-noise covariance (INC) matrix, with the corresponding RAB algorithm proposed. Firstly, the steering vectors of the incoming sources are derived using the Capon spatial spectrum and known array geometry. Secondly, a set of linear equations is established based on the signal subspace projection, from which the powers of the incoming sources are estimated. Based on the presumed angular sector of the signal-of-interest (SOI), the steering vectors and powers of the SOI and interferences are distinguished, and the INC matrix is then reconstructed. Finally, the beamformer is determined by the estimated INC matrix and SOI steering vector. The proposed algorithm is computationally more efficient than other reconstruction-based methods because there are closed-form solutions for the signal powers. Simulation results indicate that our proposed algorithm performs better than the existing methods at high signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs), and achieves nearly optimal performance across a wide range of SNR.