Suppression of NLOS errors in TDOA-AOA hybrid localization

This article handles locating a non-cooperative emitter in cluttered outdoor environments, where many sensors are positioned to locate the emitter. For outdoor localization, this article utilizes Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA) and Angle of Arrival (AOA). In localizing an emitter, Non-Line-Of-Sight (NLOS) errors occur due to an obstacle blocking the LOS path between a sensor and the emitter. We handle the practical scenario in which NLOS errors or signal path modelings are not available. Under this scenario, this article introduces an algorithm to suppress NLOS errors in TDOA-AOA hybrid localization. As far as we know, this article is novel in suppressing NLOS errors in TDOA-AOA hybrid localization. We develop a fast algorithm for suppressing NLOS errors in TDOA-AOA hybrid localization, which is suitable for real-time applications. Numerical simulations are utilized to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed hybrid localization approach. Also, simulations show that the hybrid TDOA-AOA localization outperforms both TDOA-only location and AOA-only location in LOS environments as well as in NLOS environments.