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104

Design of Robust Polynomial Beamformers as a Convex Optimization Problem

Edwin Mabande 1 Walter Kellermann 1
1 Multimedia Communications and Signal Processing, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Erlangen, Bavaria, Germany

Polynomial broadband beamforming designs enable an easy, smooth, and dynamic steering of the main beam. If these designs aim at constant beamwidth they often lead to superdirective beamformers for low frequencies, if the array size is small relative to the wavelengths. Direct control of the robustness of these beamformers is required if they are to be applied in practice. In [1] we proposed a method which allows full control of the robustness of a data-independent superdirective beamformer design. This concept can be applied directly to polynomial broadband beamforming. In this paper, we present a method which incorporates constraints for the white noise gain into a least-squares polynomial beamformer design and still leads to a convex optimization problem that can be solved directly. The effectiveness of this method in controlling the robustness and providing good spatial selectivity is shown in design examples.


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