<title>Feature-aided tracking (FAT)</title>

Abstract

Association of observations and tracks is a fundamental component of most solutions to the tracking problem. Association is frequently formulated as a multiple hypothesis test. Typically, the test statistic, called the track score, is the likelihood or likelihood ratio of the observations conditioned upon the association hypotheses. Assuming that the test is reasonably efficient, further reduction in the association error probability necessitates the introduction of additional information into the track score. This additional information is embodied in quantities called track features which are to be included in the track score. In practice, the necessary conditional probabilities of the track features are unknown. The class of non-parametric hypothesis tests is designed to provide such a test in the absence of any probabilistic information about the data. However, the test statistics used in non-parametric tests cannot be used directly in the track score. The one probabilistic quantity generally available with non-parametric tests is the Type I error probability, the probability of failing to accept a true hypothesis. If the non-parametric test is distribution free then the Type I error probability is independent of the distribution of the track features. This paper presents a distribution free, non-parametric test of the track features that can be used to test the association hypotheses and a quantity that can be included in the track score is derived from the Type I error probability of the test.