Robust CFAR Detection in Clutter with Unknown Covariance Matrix

Abstract

We conduct a simulation analysis for assessing the constant false alarm rate (CFAR) behavior of three coherent radar detectors in the presence of correlated Gaussian clutter with unknown covariance. We establish the conditions a detector must fulfil in order to ensure the CFAR property. We discuss several detectors with quasi CFAR property. The analysis of CFAR property and the performance analysis, which has been carried out in the presence of correlated Gaussian clutter with unknown covariance, show that the proposed detectors exhibit a quite acceptable loss with respect to optimum Neyman-Pearson detector