Bayesian source localization with uncertain Green’s function
Résumé
The localization of an acoustic source in the oceanic
waveguide is a difficult task because the oceanic environment
is often poorly known. Uncertainty in the environment results
in uncertainty in the source position and poor localization
results. Hence, localization methods dealing with environmental
uncertainty are required. In this paper, a Bayesian approach to
source localization is introduced in order to improve robustness
and obtain quantitative measures of localization uncertainty.
The Green’s function of the waveguide is considered as an
uncertain random variable whose probability density accounts
for environmental uncertainty. The uncertain distribution over
range and depth is then obtained through the integration of the
posterior probability density (PPD) over the Green’s function
probability density. An efficient integration technique makes the
whole localization process computationally efficient. Some results
are presented for a simple uncertain Green’s function model to
show the ability of the proposed method to give reliable PPDs.