Simulation of a Method for Detecting and Determining the Phase of Weak Underwater Acoustic Signals Based on the Analysis of the Spectrum of the Hydrophone Array Signal Matrix

The present study considers a method for the detecting objects in the marine environment using active underwater acoustic probing signals. The proposed method is based on constructing a matrix of spatiotemporal signal samples, followed by calculating its spectrum (the vector of eigenvalues) and constructing a criterion function based on the resulting eigenvalue spectrum. This approach makes it possible to detect partially coherent signals against a background of marine noise when using low-level probing signals. Numerical simulation results are presented using a Gaussian noise model after preliminary suppression of spatiotemporal noise coherence, corresponding to the assumed operating conditions of the proposed method. The ranges of signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) for which the specified confidence criterion can be satisfied are also considered. A new application of spectral concentration analysis is proposed for adaptive phase-related window selection in weak LFM signal detection.