Accuracy Study for a Piecewise Maneuvering Target with Unknown Maneuver Change Times

This article presents advances in determining the maximum estimation accuracy, as well as estimating the state for a piecewise maneuvering target with unknown maneuver change times, using passively obtained azimuth (bearings only), azimuth rate, and range measurements. We investigate two types of piecewise target motion and calculate the maximum estimation accuracy represented by the Cramer-Rao bound (CRB). Moreover, an estimation approach for estimating the target state, including the unknown maneuver change times, is developed on the basis of a maximum likelihood estimator. For two typical scenarios considering each motion model, we present and compare the results of the accuracy study, as well as the results for state estimation. Here, Monte Carlo simulations show that the estimator is able to attain the CRB.