Joint DOA estimation and source number detection for arrays with arbitrary geometry

In this paper, we focus on the problem of joint direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation and source number detection for an array of sensors. We propose a CLEAN-based sequential algorithm that uses a sequential hypothesis testing procedure. This method can be employed for any array with an arbitrary geometry. We also manage to reduce the computational complexity of the proposed method. Additionally, we derive an analytical performance bound for the source number detection algorithm. Our simulation results show that the proposed method achieves an appropriate performance even for low SNR or small number of snapshots. It is shown that the proposed method is applicable to both correlated and uncorrelated sources. Unlike popular methods, the algorithm does not require to know the number of sources for the DOA estimation and is able to estimate the number and the DOA of sources jointly.