Patent ID: 7764222

Claim:
A digital line-of-sight (LOS) processor for detecting electromagnetic (EM) pulses reflected off a target from a source that emits the EM pulses at known pulse repetition intervals and computing a LOS to the target, comprising: a plurality of A/D converters configured to convert respective analog signals from a multi-channel detector into a plurality of digital signals on respective individual channels; a digital summer configured to sum a plurality of said digital signals to produce a digital signal on a sum channel; at least one digital pulse detector configured to compares sample amplitudes of the digital signal on at least the sum channel to a detection threshold to detect pulses including pulse samples with amplitudes above the threshold and noise samples with amplitudes below the threshold; at least one threshold processor paired with said at least one digital pulse detector, said threshold processor configured to process the noise samples of at least the sum channel to estimate noise and update the detection threshold of the paired pulse detector as a function of the noise; a memory; a memory controller that upon detection of a pulse by any one of the one or more pulse detectors stores a plurality of samples for each said individual channel in said memory; and a processor that processes the sample amplitudes for the individual channels to calculate a LOS to a target.