Source-Assisted Direction Estimation Inside Buildings

— Direction estimation inside buildings is a difficult and challenging task due to severe multipath signal propagation. Numerous algorithms and techniques exist that provide highresolution direction estimation under certain conditions and channel models; however, to our knowledge they all perform poorly at indoor environments. Here, we propose a technique that enables a receiver to achieve greater reliability in estimating source direction through some collaboration with the source. We assume that the receiver and the transmitter are synchronized and they are equipped with circular phased array antennas that have beamforming capability. If the transmitter-receiver pair always steer their main lobes into opposite directions, the spatial spectrum of the received power can be used as a mean for estimating the direction of the transmitting source. In this paper, we investigate the feasibility of this methodology, and show the achieved improvement.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2006
• Where: INFOCOM
• Authors: Kamran Sayrafian-Pour, Dominik Kaspar
• Keywords: Communications, Direction Estimation, INFOCOM 2006, Severe Multipath Signal, Source Direction