Energy Detection of a Random Process in Colored Gaussian Noise

A likelihood receiver for a Gaussian random signal process in colored Gaussian noise is realized with a quadratic form of a finite-duration sample of the input process. Such a receiver may be called a "filtered energy detector." The output statistic is compared with a threshold and if the threshold is exceeded, a signal is said to be present. False alarm and detection probabilities may be estimated if tabulated distributions can be fitted to the actual distributions of the test statistic which are unknown. Gamma distributions were fitted to the conditional probability densities of the output statistic by equating means and variances, formulas for which are derived assuming a large observation interval. A numerical example is given for the case in which the noise and signal processes have spectral densities of the same shape or are flat. The optimum filter turns out to be a band-limited noise whitener. The factors governing false alarm and detection probabilities are the filter bandwidth, the sample duration, and the signal level compared to the noise. Two sets of receiver operating characteristic curves are presented to complete the example.