Fusion Processing That Adapts to Disparate or Degraded Sensor Data

Ballistic missile objects separate during deployment and this separation causes several complications and challenges to accurate target tracking of the lethal objects. One of the complications that occurs is the degraded ability to discriminate which of the separating objects are the lethal ones. Another of the complications is the degraded accuracy of the track estimates, along with the track estimates’ uncertainties. In order to minimize these complications, an accurate separation point estimator is desired to work in conjunction with the target-tracking algorithm in order to properly conduct track genealogy. We are proposing augmenting the Probabilistic Multi-Hypothesis Tracking (PMHT) algorithm with a separation point estimation capability in order to build a very effective track genealogy function. This topic is critical to the discrimination problem because identifying and tracking the different objects separating from a missile launch is needed so that the lethal objects can be determined. As part of the development and assessment process, the new track genealogy function with PMHT will be implemented in the Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) Benchmark and compared with a generic track genealogy.