Robust TDOA localization based on maximum correntropy criterion with variable center

In this paper, we propose a new robust method for the time-difference-of-arrival (TDOA) localization of a source under non-line-of-sight (NLOS) conditions. According to the maximum correntropy criterion with variable center (MCC-VC), the method jointly estimates the source position together with the kernel cen-ter and bandwidth using the TDOA measurements. In particular, we formulate two optimization problems based on MCC-VC, one estimating the kernel center and bandwidth, and the other the source position. The first problem is solved by dividing it into two subproblems, which are further approximated by con-vex problems that can be easily solved by a convex optimization package. The second problem is also divided into two subproblems by invoking the property of the convex conjugate function, which is then solved iteratively by solving the two subproblems in an alternating manner for each iteration. The pro-posed method does not require any prior information on the NLOS errors, making it easy to apply. Both simulation and real experimental results show that the proposed method performs well in both sparse and dense NLOS environments.(c) 2022 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.