Optical track initiator for multitarget tracking.

An optical processor for multitarget track initiation is presented. It uses the Hough transform to detect target tracks in a fixed time independent of the number of tracks present. In new results, we describe how the system produces target position and velocity estimates in linear time (with the number of targets). Tests of the system are presented for multiple targets with various velocities and target detection probabilities. A new thresholded Hough transform algorithm to reduce the effects of noise and false tracks in single data frames is introduced and tested. The optical implementation of these Hough transform track initiation algorithms is discussed.