Estimating 2-D angles of arrival using overlapping volume arrays

Two-dimensional arrival angles of narrowband signals impinging on a volume array are estimated. Direction-of-arrival (DOA) angles are computed by using a master volume array which can be treated as being composed of overlapping subarrays. Considering the entire array in this way, it is possible to estimate the directions of arrival for up to (M-4) sources (e.g. with a triangular prism array configuration) where M is the number of sensors. By using the orthogonality property of the signal and noise subspaces and the definition of the DOA matrix, it is proven that the employment of overlapping subarrays increases the detectability without increasing computation. The 2-D DOA angles may be determined using low observation time as well as low signal-to-noise ratios