A robust minimum variance beamformer with new constraint on uncertainty of steering vector

Abstract

A robust minimum variance beamformer, also called robust Capon beamformer (RCB), with a new constraint on the uncertainty of nominal array steering vector (ASV) is proposed in this paper. Unlike the uncertainty constraints used in literature, the proposed constraint is constructed by replacing the nominal ASV with the projected one onto the signal-plus-interference subspace. With this compact uncertainty constraint, the proposed RCB achieves higher output signal-to-noise-plus-interference ratio (SINR) compared with the conventional RCBs. Theoretical analysis and simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed RCB.