Time delay estimation using an eigenstructure based spectral method

Under the conditions that the number of sensors is much greater than the number of sources, and that the sensor-to-sensor differential attenuation factor of each coherent wavefront received by the array is negligible, a new method of time delay estimation is presented. The method relies upon a spatial separation of the sources at each frequency. An application to the simultaneous estimation of the relative sensor positions and source directions with a random array is also presented.