Patent ID: 8332185

Claim:
A method of updating estimated locations and velocities for a swarm of target objects within a Cardinalized Probability Hypothesis Density (CPHD) multi-target tracker environment including a plurality of signal detectors, said method comprising the steps of: detecting a plurality of signals with the plurality of signal detectors, the plurality of signals including target reflected signals comprising signals transmitted from one or more transmitters and reflected from the target objects; processing the detected signals with a processing device communicatively coupled with the signal detectors to generate a set {Z} comprising a total of m positive real numerical elements, each element of set {Z} representing a likelihood that a signal detected by one of the signal detectors is associated with a target object divided by a likelihood of such detected signal being noise or clutter, wherein z(i) denotes the ith element of set {Z} indexed by number i; obtaining a plurality of elementary symmetric functions for set {Z}, wherein esf(j) denotes the jth elementary symmetric function of set {Z} indexed by number j; determining a plurality of secondary symmetric functions for set {Z}, wherein for each value of index i, ssf(j,i) denotes the jth elementary symmetric function of a subset {Z\z(i)} comprising set {Z} with element z(i) removed from set {Z}, and wherein for a particular value of index i, the secondary symmetric functions are determined in accordance with a recursive relationship among the secondary symmetric function to be determined, a previously determined secondary symmetric function, one of the obtained elementary symmetric functions, and the element z(i) removed from set {Z}; and outputting the plurality of secondary symmetric functions for set {Z}.