Robust information filtering for distributed networks using mixed Gaussian distribution

Abstract

This paper proposes a robust distributed state estimation algorithm for sensor networks. In a distributed sensor network, sensor nodes may be affected by outliers and thus influence the information fusion results. In this respect, the measurement likelihood and one-step state prediction are modeled by a mixture of Gaussian distributions. In this Gaussian mixture, one Gaussian uses nominal covariance, while the other uses adaptive covariance with larger values and lower probabilities. We build a centralized multi-sensor fusion model in the variational Bayesian framework based on the aforementioned mixture of Gaussian distributions. Then, a consensus strategy is employed to convert the centralized method into a distributed one. Each node completes estimation tasks separately based on the information from itself and nearby nodes. In addition, the weight of sensor information will adaptively update according to the Gaussian distribution that mainly affects the current sensor measurement noise. Finally, simulation experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in handling outlier effects.