Azimuth Spread Estimation for Slightly Distributed Scatterers Using the Generalized Array Manifold Model

In this paper, an azimuth spread estimator (ASE) for slightly distributed scatters (SDSs) is derived based on the generalized-array-manifold (GAM) approximation model (D. Asztely et al., 1997). To improve the performance of this estimator we propose an array size adaptation (ASA) technique that adjusts the array aperture selectively for each SDS by modifying the number of antennas. This technique is applied to uniform linear arrays but can be extended to two or three dimensional arrays. Simulation results demonstrate the improvement achieved with the combined ASA-ASE scheme. In particular, it is shown that this scheme outperforms the conventional Spread-ESPRIT technique