A High-Precision Time Delay Estimation Method Based on Fourth-Order Cumulant

Time delay is a very significant measurement in the field of detection and positioning. The accuracy of time delay estimation directly influences the precision and reliability of the positioning. Aiming at improving the accuracy of time delay estimation in positioning, a new method of high precision time delay estimation is proposed in this paper. Assuming the background noise as Gaussian distribution and Laplace distribution, the new method firstly performs auto-correlation and cross-correlation operation on the received signal to suppress noise initially, and then performs fourth order cumulant operation to further suppress noise and finally extract time delay information by cross correlation method. Comparing with generalized cross-correlation method, second-correlation method and high-order cumulant method, the new method can effectively suppress Gaussian noise and Laplace noise interference. The new method can achieve higher precision and obtain high precise detection and positioning. At last the simulation results verify the effectiveness of the new method.